Reflections on Race from a Privileged Son - White Like Me

White Like Me takes no prisoners in exposing this country's sordid racial history and its present-day vestiges, which every thinking person should realize are alive and well—thriving, in fact, under this current administration. He takes an admittedly squirm-worthy subject and makes it superbly understandable through his user-friendly, almost "folksy" chronicle of his personal life experiences of white privilege. I couldn't put this book down, which is usually not the case for me with non-fiction writers. Indeed, this racial exposé that is equal part memoir truly makes the political personal, which is exactly what this nation needs if we are ever to have a "white awakening."

That being said, this book is not perfect. While overall it's a five-star read, it contains a half-dozen or so annoying typos ("your" for "you're"; "effect" for "affect"; and others I noticed but didn't initially mark because I wasn't expecting so many). I see White Like Me was published by a small press in Berkeley, California, so I can somewhat forgive this. But for as important as the subject matter is (especially with a "racist-in-chief" occupying the Oval Office), the otherwise excellent job Mr. Wise does shedding sunshine on darkness could stand a fine-toothed editing so that its presentation is equally excellent. Also, Mr. Wise, like many storytellers allowed to expound on important political/social issues through uncensored personal vignettes, sometimes veers afield or draws questionable conclusions from his personal experiences. But this is nothing that said "edit" couldn't fix.

For example, while I generally agree with the author's argument that "political power," when held by people of color, does not necessarily translate to "economic power," his example of the Prime Minister of Bermuda does not hold up to intellectual scrutiny. Alex Scott (the Black Bermudian PM) was made to apologize to a white political opponent for an anti-white comment he made via email. I daresay that (before January 2017 at least) had a white U.S. politician made a similar comment about being "sick-and-tired" of receiving criticism from people who "look like" thus-and-such Black person, he (or she) would have been chastised and forced to apologize. Mitt Romney's ("those people" don't even pay taxes") remark probably cost him the 2012 election. So while I do not disagree that Black elected officials too often have to kowtow to the sensibilities of white opponents and constituents (one need look no further than Barack Obama to see this phenomenon in play), I think the above Bahamian example falls flat.

Other than these minor weaknesses, White Like Me is a powerful read, made all the more compelling because it is written by a privileged white male—one who recognizes that being Jewish (like being gay) does not automatically obliterate one's white advantage, and who has truly put his money where his mouth is by dedicating his life to exposing and combating racism. His oft-repeated example about how his grandparents' home (in a racially-redlined district) helped finance his college education, while tiring in its repetitiveness, hit home for me. My father, lacking even a high-school diploma, was able to buy a ten-room home in a solid, all-white neighborhood with good schools and virtually no crime. It abutted a tonier town across the city line. All throughout my life, I, a veritable "nobody" with no connections, saw doors magically open as I got my education and sought higher-paying jobs and better opportunities. First, by virtue of my (actual) Jewish last name, I was (nod, nod; wink, wink) invited with open arms into probably a dozen predominantly Jewish law firms in various roles over the course of my career. Second, when I told interviewers, in all types of jobs, where I had grown up, the knowing nods affirmed me as being "one of them" despite my sketchy-upbringing, despite being half-Jewish and half-Italian, despite being female, and despite being solidly lower middle-class/borderline "white trash." That childhood address branded me a well-raised, solidly middle-class white girl who had come up on the "right side of the tracks." I moved seamlessly from cashier in high school, to secretary and paralegal in college and law school, and ultimately to attorney at large and "exclusive" law firms on both coasts. Had I been a Black woman from the Bronx sitting for those same job interviews, I seriously doubt those doors would have flung open so easily.

I think it is extremely important for every white person, regardless of background or economic station, to take stock of how their skin color has advantaged them—to whatever degree. That task honestly and humbly completed, we have an obligation to speak out whenever and however we can to acknowledge the disparities in treatment that have so benefited us compared to our brothers and sisters of color. We must recognize "white backlash" and so-called "reverse discrimination" for precisely what they are: white angst and resentment not about unfair treatment, but simply about being asked to cede a tiny bit of our privilege so that others might have a shot at the things all of us want: a decent, safe place to live; a job with a living wage; a good education for our children. Even that small bit of recognition and "sharing" is apparently too much for white people to abide and get behind. How shameful.

White apathy to racial injustice is pervasive because that injustice benefits white people and is largely invisible to us. It is so embedded into our legal system and social fabric that we view racial injustice—if we acknowledge it at all—as something happening "out there" someplace else to someone else—to "those people" about whom we might not especially care because we're essentially doing okay. And even if we do care, what are we supposed to do about it anyway? Shouldn't "they" just "get over it" and "move on"? And how can anything we say or do possibly help move the needle?

I loved Wise's allegory of a new CEO who had just taken over a multi-billion dollar corporation. He blithely tells his CFO that he plans to ignore the liabilities column of the balance sheet because "he wasn't there" when those liabilities were incurred. Too many white people argue that "my family never owned slaves" (if that happens to be true—many white families can trace their roots—and their privilege—back to slave-owning families) or "I never personally oppressed Black people," ignoring the fact that each and every one of us has been born into a system with unpaid liabilities on its balance sheet, those being the genocide of Native Americans and the enslavement and continued separation of Black and brown people. To quote Mr. Wise: "The notion of utilizing assets but not paying debts is irresponsible, to say nothing of unethical. Those who reap the benefits of past actions and the privileges that have come from whiteness are certainly among those [who] have an obligation to take responsibility for our use of those benefits." How true, typo notwithstanding.

As for what difference anything I do can make, Mr. Wise argues compellingly that ultimately "winning" the battle is beside the point. There is a long and largely ignored history of white resistance to racism and injustice in this country, and it behooves decent white people to identify with that version of our white heritage and to join in. Resisting racism, standing on the right side of these issues, and taking the moral high-ground (rather than standing idly on the sidelines while this ugly battle rages)—that is the point. It boils down to what sort of person you want to be, and what sort of life you want to live. For every one of us white folk—and especially those who call themselves Christian or "people of faith"—there is no more important question to answer in this lifetime.

I was also persuaded by the author's arguments as to why racism and unequal treatment harm not only people of color, but white people, too. Systematic unfair advantage presumes that white people aren't good enough to "make it" without the head start and "leg-up" we implicitly and undeservedly expect as our birthright. This allows too many mediocre white people to excel while only the most spectacular people of color are allowed similar gains. It lumps all white people into the same selfish, ignorant, clueless "basket of deplorables" in the eyes of our darker-skinned brothers and sisters, when many (most?) of us can, should, and in fact want to "do better" by them.

Just as our current pr*sident has given license to white supremacists to "come out of the woodwork" with their tiki torches and vile rhetoric, Mr. Wise gives moral imperative to decent, right-thinking white people to "show up" and SPEAK UP. For that message alone, for that permission, Mr. Wise's book deserves five stars.

Like Speaking Treason Fluently, another Wise book, this book contains powerful, well researched arguments that racism is alive and well. Unlike STF, Wise articulates these arguments in the context of his upbringing and the forces and experiences that shaped him into the activist he is today. Wise's style is concise and approachable . He backs up his arguments with credible yet little known American history. He exposes the deceit in modern day propaganda as it pertains to race and class. Brilliant.

It is a very interesting book about race in America. It is a well written book that clearly concepts and put them in context. The very personalized style and make it even more interesting. It is not quite an autobiography. But rather racism through a personal experience. The fact that the author update the edition is also very great.It has the intelligence to open the discussion on racism in a very honest way and take in consideration so many aspect of society it is an important read . truly an important reading.
I highly recommend this book .

Tim Wise's White Like Me, is the book I wish I had had for my many white students who needed support and assistance for examining whiteness and its attendant privileges. Very easy to read and digest.

White like me by Tim Wise is a good book indeed here are some of the things I liked and Disliked:

Likes:
1. The book is very eye-opening on what it is like to be seen as "white" here in the USA. You're more likely to be able to get a good loan,housing, and etc. You're also less likely to be stopped for drugs and the list can go on and on.

2. He uses his own life to prove some of these points (although this is also a con).

3. He also tackled some of the points that fox news has made in the past.

Dislikes:

1. It seems he believes that blacks and other non-whites are just all oppressed victims and all whites are rich,powerful, and evil.

2. If you're looking for a book with multiple stories about different people or statistics, then this book isn't for you, because it's more about his life.

3. If you have a victim complex and want to blame white people and white males for everything , then this is for you!! you'll love it.

4. He also says nothing about the black on white crime problem we have here in the USA.

Overall, There is a lot of truth in his book and I don't think he is a bad person but, he ignores a lot of the issues like black on white crime and others.

There were occasional nuggets of insight that made this entire book worthwhile. I think Mr. Wise's message would be more effective with less sarcasm directed towards those who do not share his viewpoints. I found the biographical details somewhat tedious, but I think that what Mr. Wise has to say about racism and privilege very significant.

Great book. Obviously jingoists and white nationalists (and their relatives, white racists) are going to not like the book. Nazis under Hitler wouldn't have loved a book that spoke honestly about the Nazi crimes against humanity either.

Why is it that every book like this ignores crime stastitics, ignores the fact that 6% of the population, Black Males, commit over 50% of all violent crimes? Would it then not make sense that they are more strongly represented in prison?

Wow, this is a pretty bad book. And I'm saying that as someone who actually agrees with most of what the author has to say about race relations in the United States and who disagrees with the substantive criticism of it by racist apologists here and elsewhere.

But wow.

It's hard to believe that an adult produced this. What I was hoping would be a serious socio-historical exploration of active and passive racism, of those who benefit from it and those who don't, and of the cultural constructs and institutions which perpetuate it, turned out in fact to be a self-indulgent series of personal anecdotes, only half of which pertain to the subject matter of race relations in America.

The fact that this was assigned for a class at an accredited college is even more embarassing - for the college and the teacher assigning it. I could see it being used for a high school class maybe, but college? No.

The author is clearly self-impressed and a bit self-absorbed as evidenced by how outwardly visible and cloying the irrelevant, rambling, personal references become. This is by no means a scholarly text and certainly not a history book. It is perhaps a work of pop sociology, but even that is pushing it a little as there are no academic notes, bibliography or even an index. It is actually more like an autobiographical novel, and one written with only the rudiments of style, and one which ironically uses the subject matter to heavy-handedly to justify its worth, in a manner familiar to anyone who has ever seen white people use blues, jazz, soul, and even hip hop to do the same in different contexts.

I read the first half of this book for school. My school has a race unit and it starts off with white identity development. Because part of racism is the lack of white awareness of the issues of racism. Through a positive white identity a white person can become aware of the issues that faces a person of color and then build from there. This book does a great job of introducing and explaining this concept. Through his own experiences Tim Wise narrates his white identity development and through antecedents shares his success and failures in this process. It has its lagging moments but overall it is a reality fast read, although it is deep, which slows it down in another way. I enjoyed becoming aware of this and would recommend this to anyone learning about or willing to learn about race and racism (although this is written for white identity development, people of color could also find useful and pertinent knowledge from it too).

I have to say I was a little disappointed by this work. I had always heard that Tim Wise was an staunch advocate for improved racial/ethnic relations and for working through racial dynamics among those who identify as white/Euro. After reading this book with great anticipation, I was let down. The book began with so much promise and really digging into the "issues" yet somehow devolved in my opinion into an quasi-attack on conservatives, those who are pro-life, capitalist, etc. In other words, Wise spent more time talking through his wandering years as a white, Jewish male coming of age in an era where work was hard to find and his focus seemed to be on his politics rather than on really sharing how he dealt with whiteness and racial dynamic. I appreciate his honesty, however, but I could've did without the latter half of the book quite truthfully. One of my other major complaints about this book was its lack of solution concerning Wise's experiences and feelings of his whiteness in being an ally for racial understanding and development within his own race (his stated goal in this book.) Maybe because I am multi-ethnic person of color, White Like Me was old news-meaning I didn't learn anything new from Wise. I was hoping so but alas nothing.

The experience of a rant is quit a unique one. One begins completely convinced of his or her own view on a particular subject due to their personal experience on the matter. Then one begins to let go of their reason. Their arguments become sporadic opinions that jump from one subject to the next. They might just repeat themselves or contradict themselves multiple times. With no interruption, by the end of the rant they may just be on a different topic entirely, yet they still walk away feeling satisfied to have expressed what they undoubtedly feel to be right. The audience to the rant may have agreed to the individual in the first place, but lost them in the midst of a chaotic rant. Most of us can relate, as everyone has either been guilty of ranting or a witness to a rant at least once in their lives. But would you ever feel comfortable editing, printing, and publishing your rant in book form? Thinking of the weak points, the terrible structure, and the unreasonable state you’d be in that would most definitely weaken your argument, most people would say no. But not Timothy Jacob Wise, the author of the memoir White Like Me: Reflections on Racism from a Privileged Son. In his book he argues that white privilege is a relevant issue in the United States that needs to be addressed. Although Tim’s argument seems valid to begin with, it proves ineffective as he loses his readers in the midst of excessive information, weak evidence, and his own discredibility due to a two-hundred and seventy one page rant.
The fact that the book spans to two-hundred and seventy-one pages is a testimony in itself of the weakness of Wise’s argument, for the message gets lost in its length. Chapter five alone spans twenty five pages of Wise discussing his work against the campaign of a potential racist governor. Within these pages, there are mere sentences of analysis such as “...it wasn't the job of people of color to fix us, it was our job” followed by more narrative (Wise 143). The sheer amount of information compared to the analysis takes away from Wise’s arguments and leaves readers lost and overwhelmed. Readers won’t think back to that chapter and think, “Oh, that was the part where Wise made a strong point about unconscious racism” but rather they'll just remember it as the long part with the racist governor. Often, instead of large sections of information, there are small comments and tangents that distracted readers from the initial argument. Many of these concerned irrelevant information about his personal relationships, saying things like “...the full emotional split wouldn't hit me for several more years” and “Kristy Cason was everything I had never found in any woman” (Wise 168; 189). Other statements are more opinionated and memorable such as the time he comments on cars being manufactured overseas, calling central european or “Slavs” a “pathetic lot of craftsman” (Wise 192). Each one of these comments are unnecessary. They take the focus off of white privilege and pull it toward the personal life of Tim Wise and the rest of his opinions. The thread of his argument is frayed at these points, resulting in Wise having a difficult time sewing it through the rest of the book.
It is not only the amount of information that hinders Tim Wise’s argument on white privilege, but the content itself. The content lacks sufficient sources, is filled with speculations, and often proves irrelevant to the argument. At first it may seem that he has strong evidence to support his statements such as “Studies indicate there are twice as many whites who fail to meet normal admission standards but who are admitted anyway thanks to “connection preferences” as there are persons of color who receive any consideration from affirmative action” (Wise 97). But Wise’s failure to identify his sources proves fatal as he attempts to build his argument off of mere speculation. He makes statements such as “...stereotype threat affects socially marginalized groups, since they face more stigmatizing than dominant groups” and he backs it up with “...woman and girls do worse on math exams because they fear validating common stereotypes about female math ability or the lack thereof” (Wise 45). The evidence Wise uses to back up his statement lacks a source, causing it to be viewed as a mere opinion even if it had been true and opinions and speculations do not convince readers of arguments as much as truth and solid evidence. Sometimes Wise does present evidence but it proves unrelated to his statement despite his attempts to make a connection. For example, he tells a personal story about the declining health of his grandfather and his inability to remember stories of his childhood, yet he goes ahead and states that “ the reason he didn’t have any stories was because tales about the old country and a connection to that immigrant past were often the first casualties of whiteness” (Wise 112). This is confusing as he had spent eight paragraphs talking about his grandfather developing alzheimer's but he blames his grandfather’s inability to remember on white privilege. For each of these examples, Wise shares one common failure: attempting to build evidence off of his arguments rather than arguments off of his evidence. This results in his argument having a weak and uncertain framework in which readers can easily knock over with the smallest amount of pressure if they ever feel the need to challenge his position.
We have discussed how the excessive amount of details and the content in White Like me are hinderments toward Wise’s initial argument of the presence of white privilege in America, but what about Tim Wise himself? Wise sure tells readers a lot about himself, but whether it was intentional or not, it is the way he presents himself that weakens his argument. From the beginning, Wise passively relates himself to black folks. He states that when he went from middle school to high school he had to “relearn… how to basically be white again” when just the chapter before he discusses the difficulties black folks face in assimilating (Wise 60; 18). He later speaks of the “internalized oppression” he faces from not being the stereotypical rich, Jewish kid growing up, directly stating that the same oppression “relates to people of color victimized by racism” (Wise 65). There is nothing wrong with relating to another race. The issues arise that after making known the obvious differences between himself and the typical white guy, he still addresses himself with the group as a whole. This is evident in which Wise states, “To avoid dealing with the legacy of white supremacy, we will change the subject, blame the victims, play the victim, and generally do anything to avoid confronting the truth that rests just in front of our eyes” (Wise 270). The use of personal pronouns places a facade of commonality between the author and the average reader that might for a time make them more willing to listen to his statements. But it does not last as it becomes apparent that Wise’s statements do not relate to himself at all. For Wise does not “change the subject”, “blame the victims” or “play the victim” when discussing white privilege, but he confronts white privilege, seeing that he is indeed an anti-racism activist. This distance that Wise creates between himself and his statements, causes his argument to lose credibility in the eyes of his readers. Keep in mind that the title of the book is White Like Me: Reflections on Racism from a Privileged Son. Yet Wise proves that he is neither the average white man nor the common privileged son, so why should his reflections be credible? Perhaps Wise is trying to protect himself from the sharp rebuke he gives the white race as he presents information about himself, but whatever the reason, it ultimately backfires, blowing his entire argument to pieces.
It is evident that Tim Wise has a lot to say concerning white privilege in America. But despite his good intention of raising awareness for the issue, his passions get the best of him in the case of the book. The information is excessive, drowning readers instead of inspiring them. The evidence forms a weak foundation for the argument, in which even the least critical human can find fault. Then the very credibility of the author, is destroyed by his very own arguments. Each and every one of these faults, are the result of a man caught up in his passions. If Tim Wise had been more focused on convincing people of his opinions rather than simply stating them, then his book would have gone much differently. But that is not what happend. Thus White Like Me: Reflections on Racism from a Privileged Son is not a book that can effectively convince readers that America is still a place where white privilege is a problem, but rather it is a rant from a guy with an endless supply of passion and no one around to tell him to shut up.

At first, I thought that White Like Me would be a terrible book, you know, supporting racism, but it is quite the opposite. It is still sort of terrible, though, as it stands to remind the reader that much still needs to be done, in spite of the Civil Rights Movement being part of the history books. Of course, the fact that I could make such a statement betrays me to be white like Tim Wise, the author. He makes a lot of excellent points about racism, such as how being sheltered from it is part of white privilege, or the simple fact that he was only able to publish this book because of the racist mindset of this country, which grants more respect to the work of a young white man, than to the opinions of people with, say, years of personal experience with being discriminated against.

Ultimately, I would recommend this book mostly to those who are new to this issue, and not just because I am interested in social justice and combating racism. White Like Me actually presents some thoughts I had never heard before, regarding the psychic burdens such mindsets place on even those who are privileged by the system. I also think there is some inherent value in the very recent nature of this book, that it talks about current versions of old problems, such as how some seemingly innocuous phrases are euphemisms for more overt racist opinions. Wise also has a lot to say about the way that white people are isolated from or unaware of racial inequalities and non-white communities being a big part of our unconscious racism. My main complaint about this book is that it seems to be a haphazard collection of essays, and therefore not a really compelling read, having no overarching structure. It is more the kind of thing that can be read in little portions, or photocopied to be used for short handouts, without needing to know or recall what was said in earlier sections.

I purchased Wise's book as I wanted to get familiar with the opposing viewpoint; see how the liberal mind works. I expected this to be a poorly strung together book dedicated to brainwashing opposition over to his side. In a sense, it was, but Wise presents a few very compelling arguments for his position. I had to take notes while I was reading through this, but I take issue with a few remarks that Mr. Wise notes:

On page 15 Wise is speaking about his grandparents, and more to the point, the homes with which they lived, "they nonetheless were able to afford several nice homes, in "nice" neighborhoods, all of which had been entirely white..."
Now I could be wrong here, but it seems to be Mr. "antiracist" is assuming that black neighborhoods are not nice. I wouldn't go as far to say this is openly racist, as it can easily be misconstrued, but it's interesting nevertheless coming from someone like him.

Then in the next chapter Wise says that present day whites are guilty of benefiting from white privilege. That kind of thinking makes mind-numbing sheep out of people. Imagine if your granddad went on a killing spree and was caught and sent to prison to serve 12 life sentences. He won't live that long so all of his descendants, (meaning you) must go to prison to serve the remainder of his term. Now even the US justice system wouldn't incorporate that stupid sentence.- To quote Mr. Wise, "The notion of utilizing assets but not paying debts is irresponsible."

It sickened me how Wise asserted that teachers should get hooked up to lie detectors, and if they don't espouse a liberal ideology, they would immediately get fired and sent a powerful electric shock. These are the questions Wise would pose to teachers, then my answers:

-Do you believe that some students because of race or economic status were generally less capable then other students?

No, I don't believe so. I think it harder for poorer students to do as well due to lack of school supplies, and/or other commitments. But bottom line is everybody has a brain in their heads, and there's no excuse why some can't hack it and some can. It comes down to ambition.

-Do you think that black or latino students are less capable of economic success then whites or Asians?

No that's silly. But there's quite a difference between a black person and a ghettoized black person. Just like there's Spanish peeps and there's gangsta Hispanics. The former hasn't lost their ambition or aren't trapped in the cocoon of victimology.

-Do you believe that black families place less emphasis on education that whites?

Well that's a loaded question. Like I said "black" people are on par with whites; it's just ghetto blacks that don't give a crap about education, and the leftists only enable that behavior by rewarding laziness with handouts. So what incentive to they have to better themselves?

Let's see, dunking a known terrorists head in water is torture, but electrocuting someone, then on top of that terminating them from their career is fine? Ok, I see now. If I were Wise I would've put that paragraph where he said that at the end of the book, opposed to on page 20, because a lot will be hesitant to continue reading after they digested that nugget of wisdom.

Wise put up a pretty coherent argument about black children being aware of racism, and white children having a void in their heads about racism, until he uttered this little gem, "When black mothers have to teach their sons to keep both hands on the wheel if stopped by a police officer, so as not to get shot- something I have never heard a white mother speak to her son." What a hyperbolic assertion there! I have never heard of a black mother saying that.

Then he goes on to suggest that teachers wanted to split him and his black friends up. Ok, I can kind of see that, as it was in the 70s. But none of that would happen now. Wise is trying to use events from the past to conjure up hostilities and sentiments that racism is never going to end, and in fact, that it snowballs and gets worse.

Wise so vigorously asserts that whites are ignorant to "white privilege", but at the same time, he doesn't acknowledge "black privilege." Blacks get the same or more opportunities then whites, mostly due to the racist policy of affirmative action. Wise obviously represents the sentiments of those on the liberal side, and especially the whites, who should feel ashamed of themselves. The liberals, more to the point, the leftist whites, have been plotting and scheming the Caucasian race's downfall since the 60s. This isn't even about white vs black, (racism) which the liberals and Wise will gladly perpetuate. It's about maintaining a proud and successful culture. If you want to destroy a culture, you begin at a young age. Children's b.s. detectors aren't quite up to par as of yet, so they willfully swallow what they're being forcefed daily by the leftist media conglomerates. It all begins in school. Black children are almost always pre-determined as the "cool" kids, until proven otherwise. Hip hop and rap have infiltrated our culture so our once hardworking children, disregard work and strive to get lousy grades to "fit in" with the gangstas. Hence, when graduation arrives, and they are in the real world, they have no marketable skills in order to succeed. Hence, more and more people fill up the welfare rolls and that's more relying on the government. Rap music and the like is just 1 mechanism meant to split the white race up, so in turn we are battling against one another (liberals vs conservatives vs independents vs tea partiers vs green party vs libertarian vs communist, etc, etc, etc). We are now the most divided race on this planet, and by no means should you think this is an accident. Tim Wise is merely the messenger here, wrongfully under the impression that he's fighting for the right cause. Not unlike the terrorists who wrongfully think they are "freedom fighters" doing the work of Allah.

Wise speaks about all his negative reviews on this site from Neo-Nazi's, well what does he expect to happen? Does Wise unjustifiably think he speaks for the entire white race? When one puts forward an opinion in the public domain, you are bound to get some disagreements.

Wise thinks he proves racism by his little hypothetical about a pill that to anybody who doesn't already know you, will make you seem black to them. He said he never heard of a white person say that they would take it. Well Tim. Let me be the first to say I would. My friends and family would still see me as white, and my employment is pretty good, even in this lackluster economy, so I probably won't be out looking for another job in the near future. And where I work, being white is chocked full of disadvantages, and hardly any "white privilege" to speak of. So I would have absolutely nothing to lose and everything to gain.

In this book, Wise constantly is under the impression that he is some kind of hero, or more precisely an "antiracist." As if that's something you should strive for. Anti-racist is just a euphemism for anti-white, let's call a spade a spade here. I almost threw up in my mouth every single time Wise referred to himself or other liberals as that. It's akin to calling someone in a wheelchair a contortionist.

When Wise lists some examples parents can set to teach their children to be antiwhite, he insists that parents refuse to attend a church that represents Jesus as white. Well Tim newsflash: That's just about every church in America, minus the black churches.(Do I have to remind you of Rev. Wright's fiery sermons? I guess children should be subjected to similar diatribes huh?) So, you're basically telling parents to convert to liberalism and diss God. He tells us to speak up for the racist policy of affirmative action, and to refuse jobs, no matter how lucrative they are, if you know someone (based on being white).

Haha, on page 121, Wise makes a comment that reeks of racism. He was speaking about a time when he met several antiwhite liberals in Seattle, and they would ask blacks what they could do to assist them. Wise says it isn't always easy to ask them, as "frankly folks of color get tired, exhausted even, by whites asking How can we help? Not because allyship isn't valued, but because the question reeks of helplessness, and essentially asks black and brown folk do to all of the thinking." This is the most openly racist comment I have heard yet, I'm utterly shocked that no one as of yet picked up on it. Wise is implying that blacks and browns have a difficult time thinking; in laymen's terms he's saying their stupid. 50 lashes with a wet noodle Mr. antiwhite.

I had to re-read this line a few times, as when I first read it, I did a double-take, I couldn't believe it. "While much discussion has been had recently about whether or not America should apologize for slavery- and I happen to think apologies are pretty empty absent substantive reparations and recompense" What?????? Wise thinks blacks deserve reparations???? I bet a great many blacks will take that as an insult. I nearly vomited when I read that sophomoric, silly assertion. Needless to say I had to quit reading after I managed to stomach that wild assertion. Apologize? I bet a great many Africans envy the American blacks and would give anything to have their ancestors brought over here as slaves.

This book would be extremely relevant if it were written in the peak of the Civil Rights era, but it is simply a remnant of the past now. Wise often talks about if he were black and all the other variables in his life were the same, that things would have happened differently. Ok, I can certainly agree, but this is 2010, not the 1970s. It's a different show altogether now, and one that caters and coddles blacks. I'd say a black today has the very same if not more opportunities then a white. Let's take basketball as an example. If you are one of the captains who chooses, and there is a line of people, 9 blacks and 1 white. Who are you going to pick first? Who do you think would be the last pick? A white person must PROVE their worth first, whereas a black gets a free pass because of the fact that he is black, he is assumed to be athletic. Wise falls into the trap of thinking, "ohh, things were racist when I was growing up, so they just have to be moreso now!" All in all I would read this book with a grain of salt, in other words, don't take it as gospel. It's basically a cult manual for the disease that is liberalism. Wise clearly thinks that he is above all minorities, and doesn't really go too far out of his way to disguise his racism. He was probably banking on only the fact that minorities and liberals will read this, and he already implied that minorities are dumb, and liberals will put a positive spin on basically anything a fellow liberal says. I think the only reason why Wise is speaking like so is because of money. If a white person came out speaking about how lazy and stupid blacks are, he'd be yet another racist, and black-balled from a lucrative career. But when a white person sells out his very own race and puts them down, now that's where the money is. It won't work by someone explaining the truth to Wise, Wise has to get schooled real world style; something needs to happen that'll change his views.

With that being said I enjoyed reading this book, as I relish in reading all contrasting perspectives to further solidify my stance, or if presented logically and soundly and backed up by evidence, alter my stance.

I believe strongly that racism is alive and well in America. I also believe very few whites are willing to acknowledge this and fewer still who are willing to advocate real change. Mr. Wise however has gone to such an extreme end of the spectrum and made what in my opinion are such severely erroneous conclusions his book is worthless to use to persuade those in need of insights.
To me this book falls into the same category as Fox News or MSNBC. Extremism appealing to extremists. No sense of objectivity to the information.

This book really makes you think of the privileges we have being white. Things we never have to think about, like not having to worry about being pulled over just because we are white, or not getting a certain job because we are white. Things we take for granted and don't even think about as being privileges.

In this book, Wise is searingly honest with the reader about his personal experiences, thoughts, gut reactions, and family histories, in order to really lay bare everyone's vulnerability to the deep-rooted racist mentalities that still afflict this country. He uses his own experiences to assert that no matter how anti-racist white people try to be (and he's including easily-assimilated immigrants such as Eastern Europeans, Russians, and yes, Ashkenazi Jews), institutional hostility toward people of color is so culturally pervasive that it runs inextricably deep through the American psyche.

Important things to remember from this book are evidences of racism still strong in this country such as people of color overall getting harsher sentences for the same crimes as white people, receiving harsher treatment from law enforcement, getting passed up for advanced learning opportunities in public schools, getting a reputation through popular media for being a drain on the economy (poor white people are just as guilty of abusing the welfare system as poor people of any other color)

Things like that I agree with - yes, it's important to fight against such cases of unfairness and injustice. And if I've learned anything having lived through, studied, and experienced wars, insurgencies, and terrorism, it's that opinions that run strong among minority groups should not be discounted. If a group on the whole feels marginalized, it's important that their thoughts, feelings, and suggestions for progress be heard and included in any dialogue on future policy, in public schools, in universities, in all levels of law and government.

I disagree with his idea that light-skinned, assimilated immigrants and their descendants have no cultural identity beyond enjoying the advantage of not being black (or Latino, Asian, native, or other generally or historically discriminated-against group). (The legendary Irish solidarity in Boston that still runs strong to this day jumps to mind. And massive reunions among many white families I know are very common.)

Overall, he raises very important issues with eye opening cases and trends you don't hear about much in mainstream media. But he seems to pound his ideas so hard that he may not be helping the problem as much as he hopes to.

I give this two-and-a-half stars. Wise means well for the most part, and has a few good insights - the strongest of which are covered in the last three pages of his book. While this is more about the author's perceived triumphs and less about non-whites, except in the abstract.

He offers sporadic examples of white racism in action, but few of those examples reflect his own white racism, and unfortunately, his tone throughout each chapter smacks of false modesty. He is obscenely self-congratulatory and comes across as very self-centered and arrogant. The editing is sloppy: I found several glaring grammatical errors throughout (issues with pronouns, especially). As a fellow Jew, white person and "progressive", I agree with Wise's basic anti-white premise, but found it impossible to ignore a hypocritical rant Mr. White left on Facebook (<[...]>), reposted by Aljazeera:

" ...it's not on me sweetheart..plenty of people of color get book deals and speaking gigs each year...if u di...dn't its not on me...it's cuz u havent said anything that anyone finds valuable... "

... So much for Wise acknowledging his advantage via white privilege (as proclaimed in his book), not to mention the frequent advantage of possessing a Jewish last name as an aspiring American writer/author, as compared to the steep challenges non-white non-Jews face getting published. (I respect my fellow Jews, but we need to admit our names do open more doors in publishing due to our dominance in that industry.) Mr. Wise, you shouldn't draw the narcissistic conclusion that the non-white non-Jews who don't get published simply have "nothing to say" compared to you.

Tim Wise's name is well-known and I have read many of his essays over the years. So as I was about to read this book, it's safe to say I had some expectations for it. The verdict: it surpassed them. In the first few pages, the book seems a bit aimless, and at various points in the book his language is a little off-putting (by that, I mean his very free use of words like F-bombs). But after the first few pages, and getting past the occasional language obstacle, he shines with it.

He proves very adept at illustrating how ever-present race is in everyday life, and I don't make this point lightly. I already felt I had a good understanding of this, but some of his examples prove that wrong and show that it's present even in places I didn't think that was the case. He shares stories from his family as well as life outside of home that all drive home his points well.

Most of all, as is the case in his essays, Wise gets real about race as it concerns White people. He pulls no punches, evident in several parts of the book. He makes it clear more than once that merely "being a good person", for lack of a better phrase, will never be enough to make a significant dent in racism. He points out that for White people doing this work, the rewards are not what one might expect - don't expect to be on the cover of a major magazine or the top story on the six o'clock news, and don't expect to be loved by all the way athletes and entertainers are worshiped in America. And he does a great job of showing how racism hurts White people, examples including how privilege can put us in danger or rob us of our self-determination, and in perhaps an extreme example, how it can lead the poorest of Whites to support politicians and policies that don't help them at all but profess to be anti-Black - the latter being the reason they support the politician or policy.

This is a challenging book. It certainly was for me, and I haven't been a passive observer on this subject matter during my life. It made me examine myself and my thoughts on this subject, yet it also in some points affirmed that if nothing else, I may be on the right track, as there were certainly parts I identified with. It's also realistic in that the overall picture it paints is that for many reasons, fighting the rampant White privilege in America is not easy at all.

All in all, this book is well worth reading, especially for a White person who wants to do something positive on race.

As a white dude, I can say that Tim Wise understands white folks in the states, probably as well as anyone can. He knows all about how we think and how we insulate ourselves from reality and how we have the uncanny ability to simultaneously tell others to be responsible while we blame them for our problems. And he's even anticipated your unwitting and latently racist attack / defense in expressing your outrage that there is such a thing as white privelege (which you will put scare quotes around, "privelege", to say that it doesn't exist.) He knows your tricks, and he is an extremely engaging and humorous author on top of it.

This is one of the single best books I have ever read and is definite must-read material for anyone living amidst a lot of racism, especially the kind that doesn't see itself as such.

Tim Wise gets at a pervasive reality of our society that is rarely written about: the experience of privilege. This is profoundly useful. He's not a perfect writer, but the book unpacks the complexities, the social and psychological layers of privilege, in detail. There are many good texts on racism, especially from writers of color. There are lots of other areas of rank/oppression/privilege that are important to understand. But to understand what it is like to have white privilege, Wise is the guy. Thoughtful readers can extend this to deepen their understanding of privilege as it manifests in other areas of rank (gender, sexual orientation, class, etc.). Thoughtful educators can use this book to highlight the privilege side of the dynamics of race and other ranked social memberships. Privilege tends to be invisible: Wise makes it visible.

When I first opened the cover of White Like Me by Tim Wise, I was quickly captured by the magical combination of stories, soul-baring, and polemic. Then, as I proceeded on through the book, I despaired for a moment that those who need it worst would probably never read it or at least would never read it all. But as I continued, I decided that this is not true, that the ones who need to read this book the most are not necessarily those White people who have already lost their minds to the last stages of the psychosis of racism, but rather those of us who have as yet a shred of sanity that might respond to such a dose of truth. I have more than a hundred books on the socially-constructed political notion of "race." It occurred to me as I read the closing lines of this amazing treatise, that it has now become the cornerstone of my collection. There are only a relative few monumental volumes that stand through history as quintessential statements on human existence during one age or another. One hundred years from now, if we have not obliterated everything on the earth by then, this slim book will stand with those earlier works as the clarian call that led our nation to a new dawn of hope or as the announcement of the beginning of the end. Open up, White People, it's time to take our medicine.

Not a fan... page after page of self hate, cloaked in self-righteousness, masquerading as tolerance and enlightenment. I can see why the left loves this book. Narrow focus and unenlightened, but we'll written. If it was a movie it would be Birddemic starring Morgan Freeman & Gerrard Butler, instead of shawshank redemption starting Dean Kane and Ian Zierling.

White Like Me is written in the same dynamic and fierce manner in which its author speaks. Never sounding like a scholarly work (though those are good, too, sometimes!), this revealing introspection reads like the opposite end of a lively debate to which you, the reader, are challenged to respond.

I own a precious copy of the text, which I have read a few times now, each time wishing I had the strength to put it down. As a voracious reader of race theory, I have never before encountered a white author like Wise. He writes with passion, immediacy, and familiarity. The stories he recounts about his life are never told with any air of superiority as he makes his sharp points about racist conditioning. As a black woman, it was nice to read a white male author and not feel a paternalistic hand.

My hope is that many more people become privy to Tim Wise's honest self-inspection and that many who read will be personally challenged to respond in kind, by confronting their own beliefs about white privilege in our society. The book is definitely worth the buy, especially for those who are disillusioned with the way our nation's institutions and social networks operate on a surface level.

If you want something subversive, engaging, and relevant, please, read this book.

"White Like Me" is a brilliant and personal deconstruction of institutionalized white supremacy in the United States. Wise is not so interested in the raging bigots, as exemplified in three of the postings below, but rather in the everyday, unconscious white supremacy that appears as normal to white US citizens. I teach courses on race in the United States and have already assigned "White Like Me" to a class. I recommend that other teachers do the same. The students, both people of color and white, found it transforming. It is a beautifully written, heartfelt memoir.

I read this book as a book club selection. The book was interesting. However much of the material was redundant. As times, I felt the author was reaching to find examples to support his main idea. It was a decent book, but I would borrow it instead of buying this one.

Mr. Wise's mother's family was descended from slave owners. His maternal grandfather was able to attend officer training school in the military and have a long career in the army corp. of Engineers. His paternal great-grandfather was a Russian Jew who went through many extreme hardships to get to this country in 1910 and endured anti-Semitism and anti-Slavic bigotry. However because his great-grandfather had white skin and integrated fully into American culture, discarding the ways of the old country, he was able to set up a number of successful liquor stores in Nashville TN i.e. even in the anti-Semitic South. Wise's paternal grandfather ran one of these stores in a black neighborhood in Nashville for many decades and was able to lead a comfortable life.

Black people of course were excluded from officer training school, could not own slaves to accumulate wealth or establish businesses in white neighborhoods. Thus they could not pass on the wealth, prestige and other benefits to their descendants the way Wise's descendants could to him. Black Americans until the 60's were virtually excluded from such government programs as the VHA and the FHA that allowed many tens of millions of white families to acquire homes and build up their assets.

Wise's mother and father, always of very modest income and whose dysfunctional relationship because of his father's alcoholism made life miserable for their son, were kept above water by financial aid from his relatively well off grandparents on both sides. In order to help Wise pay for an education at Tulane University where he was accepted in spite of having SAT scores 200 points below the admission average, his mother took out a loan with his maternal grandmother's house as collateral. His maternal grandparents, of course, had been able to by nice houses in nice neighborhoods because they were white, and were able to pass on such property with its accumulated value over the years to their grandson. Blacks had been excluded from purchasing such fine property and accumulating the benefits from it over the years as they are to a lesser extent today.

At school, Wise was a slightly above average student at best and often got mediocre grades. However, he was always placed in high track classes from kindergarten onwards because it was assumed he was bright, where his black classmates were often placed in low track classes as youngsters even if they had relatively high achievement scores because it was blithely assumed they had less ability. Wise observed this attitude in teachers and counselors who treated black students with scorn and ridicule. Wise faced a more subtle attitude from teachers because so many of his friends were black. She made sure that he went to genuinely integrated schools. AT one point, one of his white teachers denounced his mother to her face for allowing Wise to associate with "black savages" and Wise's mother made sure that this teacher was removed.

Wise points out how harmful white privilege is for its beneficiaries. It gives the white person a false sense of invincibility. Wise relates his experience consuming marijuana and booze during high school and in his dorm in his early years at Tulane and how he and his fellow students did so blatantly and without much fear that persons in authority would punish him, certainly not the way that black people are punished for such transgressions. Wise ran a very profitable fake ID business during his high school years but was never caught despite the obvious crudity of many of his ID's. White people feel that the dominant system in this country allows them to succeed at anything. Thus all too many white people go into depression when things don't work out and get semi-automatic rifles to shoot up their workplaces or if they are children, they steal their parent's guns to go shoot up their schools. Yet white people, or the ethnicities which are lucky enough to have themselves classified under that label, do not have their genetics or culture explored for clues as to what makes them shoot up workplaces or what makes young white college students so prone to alcohol abuse.

Wise recalls how he learned about talking to working class white people in Louisiana during his leadership in the campaign to rollback David Duke's effort to become Louisiana's national senator and then governor in 1990-91.. He tried to talk to white working class people about how they should focus their anger at corporate executives and the politicians who suppress union rights rather than the Chicano immigrants, blacks and welfare recipients that demagogues like Duke and Buchanan tried to divert them to. Of course, the self-esteem that comes from feeling superior to blacks that has been such a part of white working class consciousness refuses to go away in the South. Wise quotes a man who once told him that he would be willing to work for a dollar a day if only institutionalized segregation would return.

Wise advises that the best way white people can help black people in their struggle is by using their prestige in this society to protest stores that harass black shoppers on grounds of alleged shoplifting, schools that degrade black children, banks that don't loan to blacks and so on. Above all they can make black people feel a little better by genuinely accepting the truth of the stories blacks tell of the constant subtle and blatant racism in their everyday lives. Most white people, Wise observes, believe racism against people of color is pretty much a thing of the past, while blacks overwhelmingly believe it is very much a part of their lives. He points out that it is quite racist for a white person to dismiss black people's claims of racism, because it assumes that black people really don't know what's going on their lives but the white person dismissing the claims does. White people can have no idea how it is to be black in this country, especially because so few of them have any close association with black people.

This book absolutely blew me away. So much so that I read it all in one night. Most books I've read on racism and related topics are pletty bland, but the author in this case really cuts through the high-minded theories and scholarly analysis, to provide a compelling first person account of how racism and privilege continue to shape life in America. I think this book would be good for beginners to these subjects as well as those more experienced in the relevant discussions. Although the book might strike some as pessimistic about the prospects for change, I think the final chapter in particular--which is really more of an epilogue than anything else--wraps things up really well, and gives us all hope about the possibility that we can really make a difference and change society for the better.

The only criticism I have of the book is that there are several errors in typesetting and a few proofing errors too. These aren't the authors fault of course, but they are a bit distracting in places.

Anyway, overall a top quality piece of work, which relies on irrefuatable logic, excellent prose, and will challenge any reader to take a hard look at the society in which we live.

Racial discrimination has always been a problem in our society. Decades ago people of color were seen as incompetent people and became slaves to the white people. But over the years as a society we have come to denounce discrimination based upon color and tried to make everyone equal. However, as much as we may like to believe that our society has come to see everyone as equal, it has not. In Tim Wise book "White Like Me: Reflections on Race from a Privileged Son" he shows us how color the of someones skin leads to privilege or discrimination.

In his first chapter is talks about how before we are born our life is already set our for us. Before we even enter the world we have already been given a race and place in society. If we are born white we will have a life of privilege. However, if we are born of a different race we will be discriminated against and have to fight for the privilege we want. It will more than likely determine how we are treated in school by our teachers, who will get in trouble with the law, who will attend college, who will live in poverty and who will not, and who obtains the good jobs and who gets the minimum wage jobs. All of these things will already be set for you because of the race of your parents. Your parents part in society is what you will be born into and that is what your life will be like before you even have a chance to grow up and have a choice of your own.

Education is one place where race plays a big role in privilege. Wise talks about how his whole school experience was tainted by discrimination wether it was racialized placement of students into advanced or remedial classes, or the way extracurricular opportunities were for white students only, or the fact that dances revolved around white music, or even that the curriculum was almost completely Eurocentric (15-16). Wise even talks about a time where him and an African American student had both gotten into trouble at school one day. They had then gotten sent to the principals office to receive their punishments. In this instance privilege helped Tim because he only received a verbal warning while his friend John got paddled by the principal. Because Tim was born of a white family he was not paddled that day at school. Wise mentions another time where the fact that he was white gained him many privileges. While he was in highschool he would attend many parties where alcohol was being served and drugs were being used and that there were many times where the cops would come up on the property because of a noise complaint, and at no point at any of these parties was any one arrested for illegal drinking or drug use and it was all because it was in a white neighborhood and attended by mostly white people. If it had been a part in the black neighborhood attended by African Americans they police would have had no problem stopping the party and arresting anyone that had been drinking or doing drugs.

Another privilege he received was that because of color he was not seen as a threat to anyone. One night he got lost on his way to a dinner and he never had to be afraid that anything would happen to him in this rural area because he was a white person. If it had been a black person in that area and he walked up to a house and asked for directions the people would have never opened up the door for him because they would have thought he was going to cause trouble. It is these stereotypes that people obtain before they are even born. People see a black baby and they probably think that he's going to grow up to be a trouble maker while a white baby is seen as someone that is going to grow up to be someone with a great job.

Wise then goes on to his chapter about resistance. In this chapter he talks about how discrimination is always there not matter if it is obvious or not, and as white people we just fail to see it or just ignore it. But we are people of privilege so how do we know what discrimination looks like or is because as white folks we have never been discriminated against. We refuse to see what African Americans are telling us when it comes to racism. Wise says "whites refuse to believe what people of color say about racism in their own lives-and have refused to believe it in every generation" (67). We just push it off as them blowing it out of proportion or being over reactive to something. But the privileged just don't want to see it. We like our privilege and don't want to lose that part of our life and therefore refuse to accept that there is still discrimination in our society.

In today's society discrimination is not out right accepted. However, discrimination behind closed doors still happens. We judge people based upon their color and not who they are. When people see a African American on the street they think to themselves keep an eye on him because he could be dangerous, while a white person would not even be considered dangerous. African Americans are watched more in stored because it is figured they will be the ones to steal and not a white kid. Then in education African American kids are mostly seen as the trouble makers in the classroom. No matter how much we try race will always be a problem in our society, and we just need to learn to see it when it is happening and step up and say something when it happens. By doing this we can work to obtain a society where there is no discrimination but were everyone is born into privilege.

If you ever want to know how to respond to a racist joke, this is the book for you. I can't say enough about this book.

Eloquent, readable, and PRACTICAL piece of work by Tim Wise. He is not condemning whites, he isn't holier than thou, and he doesn't tell whites to feel guilty for their privileges. Through his stories he shows how whites can ACT to resist racism. His humility comes through in his stories about his white male privilege throughout his entire life and it was extremely helpful to me as a white woman.

He also explains the complicatedness of being a well-meaning white person who sometimes doesn't speak up when a racist joke is told, who doesn't really act to end racism, and who is only angry at racism but fearful or confused about how to act to address racism.

This book is for whites of every awareness level--from those who have just heard about "white privilege" to those like myself who have been reading about it for 10 years.

KUDOS, Tim!

Tim Wise came to speak my school in the last month and what he said made a lot of sense to me. My school is largely white and he discussed to us, in his 30 minute speech, how white privilege has blinded us from the true problem.

At first I thought he didn't seem to have a point, so I went to his book to see what he actually meant. What I learned from his book "White Like Me" is that there is such a thing and that is something that has really opened my eyes to the world around me.

Tim Wise writes in his book about the way that being white has benefitted all white people, even in the most subtle ways. He argues that many of the advantages that we enjoy are because of our skin color and we should be aware of that. He also discusses that racism is a system that is in effect in our lives, a thing that we are surrounded by constantly. It is something that is futile to fight, but a system that we should always be aware of and do everything in our power to work within the system.

His book is well written and is filled with interesting anecdotes that support his theories. I found his book very interesting and I think is an important read for any white person in America. It makes the world that we live in just a little clearer and allow us to see the racism that is around us every day. Wise gives the reader the tools to fight the system and the knowledge to work with it.

White Like Me is one of the most personally reflective books that I have ever read. As a teacher, his remarks on the different tracks children are railroaded into, are dead on. His stories are very personal and it is easy to relate it to members of my own family. The story of his grandmother's fight with Alzheimer's and the issue it raised with race, made me reread that story 4 to 5 times. It is a small book in length of pages, yet it takes quite a while to read it, simply because you have to stop and think on almost every page. I have recommended this book to all of my open-minded friends, white or black.

White Like Me tells the story of race through the privileges of a white anti-racist activist Tim Wise. Wise goes through six phases of explaining the complexity of race and white privilege: born to belonging, privilege, resistance, collaboration, loss, and redemption. The book takes the reader through the journey of his work and life, and successfully illuminates many race issues that white Americans have blinded themselves to. Tim Wise opens the blinds on racist ideas and white privilege to leave white Americans to step into the light and face the destruction that racism has created in our society.

Born to belonging expresses the intricate web of white privilege that is in every white persons life. If you have the right skin color you will be handed certain privileges without question. Whites experience race everyday because of "advantages, privileges, and belonging" that are handed to us (3). Tim Wise explains that in every instance of his life he has gotten where he is today because of privilege. White people who think they don't experience race they really do. The mere instance that they have never met a person of a different race is experiencing race itself! Everything happens for a reason in our country based on race. It influences where we live, who we know, where we go to school, and what jobs we get. Born to belonging shows that experiencing race is inevitable in our society. It makes no difference whether you are among the white privileged or the oppressed blacks because its forces are continually occurring. Whites are no longer bystanders in the fight against racism because the excuses of lack of experience are a lie. Everyone experiences race whether it is privilege or racism itself.

Wise does an exceptional job explaining the tangled web of white privilege in society, and the second chapter privilege backs up his claims with several examples. He really hits home the message of the privilege he is talking about with his experiences.

One of the best examples I believe is his insight on race and the attack of 9/11. Whites felt that they had been attacked for who they were and Wise states that, "lots of non-white folks know what it means to be attacked for who they are [and] what it's like to be terrorized"(58). Whites have been fed lies about America and it's greatness. The only people that it is great for are whites. Wise sheds light on the absurdity of some people's false reality. In a twisted way he writes their ignorance as almost amusing. It is nothing of the sort however because they are completely oblivious to the reality before them. The reality wasn't clear to me before reading the novel, but pointing out my denial of it has shown me my ignorance. We really have been led to believe that America is a grand country, a land of the free. There is no freedom for the non-whites because their struggle with race is constant.

After being confronted with reality that racism isn't a thing of the past, Wise offers the path of resistance. It isn't easy to resist racism and a society that is based on your privileges, but it is our power to stand up for what is right. White Americans have power over non-whites because people take what we say on the subject as legitimate. After confronting the reality of white privilege there is no turning back.

Tim Wise points out an important point that "people of color, as always, will pretty much take care of themselves"(98). Tim Wise does such an excellent job pointing out that African Americans don't need to be taken care of by us. People who do resistance for the simple pat on the back and to ease their guilt are wrong. Non-whites owe us nothing for our anti-racist work. We should be doing it to eliminate the "evil" in our community and fight the urge to collaborate. People should be on the path to resistance because it is the right thing to do, and not just to make ourselves feel better.

Racism is not only doing harm to non-whites, but also to white Americans as well. Americans struggle to keep our white privilege because it allows us to never be on the receiving end of suffering. The gain of having power over people below us comes with costs. Wise explains the harm of these costs like, "internalized racist beliefs turning us into people we're not, [...] white privilege blinders whites to real dangers and makes us less safe, [...] loss of our actual ethnic and national heritages is painful" (146). The willingness to accept these costs just to maintain privilege is absurd. We need to fight to keep our resistance at all costs. This fight is hard though because we've been conditioned in society to have an internal bias. It is important to remember that the fight of resistance in our internal racial bias is constant, and we just have to keep beating it back.

Tim Wise, and White Like Me, has allowed me to take off the blinders that I've had on. Never before have I realized the strong influences of white privilege in society. America is in a dire need for people to choose the path of resistance in the injustice of racism. Racial injustice in our society isn't going to disappear easily, but it is the mindset of people who chose resistance that can make a little difference.

Tim Wise has the rare ability to interrelate his personal experience with the broader scope of the issue of racism. Through this narrative he takes the audience on a journey of self-reflection that anyone can relate to regardless of background or experience base. "White Like Me" is a great autobiography that touches on racism rooted in social behavior.

For those not convinced in about Wise's own experience that racism is a very real and present problem, I recommend without hesitation that his other book, "Affirmative Action: Racial Preference in Black and White" be read. Both readings achieve the same end but through different means. For those who appreciate writing, I recommend "White Like Me," but for those who need studies and statistics, I recommend "Affirmative Action."

What Tim Wise presents in his books is parallel to what he's doing in the realm of social science. His activism in an inactive world is something that we should all draw from.

This book is the best explanation of white privilege I've ever read. All American children should be required to read this book before high school; it would go a long way towards ending the racism, both hidden and overt, that still plagues this country. Millions of white Americans have no idea the extent to which they have benefitted from white privilege. I wish I could give them (us) all a copy.

I enjoyed reading the book and it helped open my eyes to some things I wouldn't have noticed previously. The author can be a bit long winded about specific topics and a tad over zealous about things, but great read on racism.

There's not too many people in today's American society that are proud to be racist; let alone willing to admit to it. As most of us have learned, we've made major strides toward equality as a country and I would assume that this is something most people are proud of. However, because of the great efforts to fight racism and the history lessons that most of America's children are taught, the majority of America's white population refers to racism as a "thing of the past". Whether or not it's a touchy subject that not many people care to discuss or honest ignorance, it is something that is very prevalent in today's world, and a major thing that whites take for granted. Tim Wise discusses similar issues in his book entitled "White Like Me" and helped to open my eyes, me being a white, middle class, suburban girl, to a lifestyle that I had been taking for granted.

The book "White Like Me" reveals what it really means to be white in the U.S. today. Tim Wise opens his reader's eyes to the privileges whites are born into, how we can choose to resist racism and stand up for what we truly believe in, and also how white Americans can begin the path to redemption. As the book begins, Wise presents the reader with a question dealing with the beginning of one's life. He asks, "Does your life begin o the day you came into this world, or does it begin before that, with the lives of you family members... without whom you would never have existed?" (Wise ). This is an important question that many of us have never asked ourselves, and therefore, considered some trivial issues, such as racism, as being out of our control. Wise answers the question by stating that the story of his life begins much earlier than the day he entered this world; and the way he justifies his response makes me think the same thing. As Wise admits, none of us were born onto a "blank slate of neutral circumstance". The day we are brought into this world we inherit our ancestor's experiences whether we like it or not. Being white is one of those inherited items, and it wasn't until I read this book that I really thought about what that meant. As many of us do, I took my whiteness for granted, never thinking twice about what it's like to be part of the minority in America today and never thinking about the privileges I've received solely due to my race. Wise talks about his experiences growing up that taught him about white privilege, beginning as early as elementary school. One instance that stands out the most is one dealing with the way white children and black children are punished in a school setting. Not to mention, how often teachers discriminate against their children of color labeling them dysfunctional, lazy, or slow. Wise recalls a time when he and a friend, a black friend, were reprimanded for interrupting the class's milk break and were sent to the office. The author admits that it was this experience that gave him his "first experience in the way white privilege plays out in the arena of discipline and punishment," when his friend was paddled for his poor behavior and he was not. He makes it clear that this was not a blatant act of racism however; the principal was simply obeying Wise's parent's wishes to not use physical force on their child, which they sent to him in a letter. The parents of the black child had not done so, and a black woman participating in one of Wise's workshops gave the rest of the white folks attending the answer as to why they hadn't done so. She began to explain the fear of many black mother's in this country today: "The fear that persons in positions of authority -most immediately police -may well end the life of their man-child if they misinterpret a move, a look, a glance, a comment, or a smirk" (Wise 22). This is something that I, and many white Americans like myself, have never had to worry or even think twice about. She further explained that, "...even though they aren't thrilled about allowing school officials to discipline their children in such fashions, many parents of black children feel that they have no choice. "A paddle, after all, or the flat of one's hand will sting, it may even bruise, but it will not end one's life the way a bullet will", she exclaimed (22). To many of the parents it's important to teach their children self-control at an early age in order to prevent further and or greater catastrophe down the road.

Tim Wise also recalls numerous parties he attended at the homes of other white kids where there was excessive amounts of drinking and drug usage, and when the police came they only reprimanding they got was because of the loud music being played. He's quite certain that had the parties been mostly black kids that the situation would have been dealt with much differently and much more harshly. I can relate to situations like the one Wise described because I too grew up in a white suburban community where similar parties had taken place. We would build up huge bon-fires and have coolers full of beer with at least forty to fifty kids gathered around drinking, laughing, and having a good time. It wasn't rare that a cop car would roll past every now and then, but no one seemed to pay much attention to it. They never came up and arrested people for under age drinking or possession of an illegal substance, though there was plenty to go around. It wasn't that we thought we were rebellious teenagers or that we were above the law, but we were never forced to think of the serious punishment we all could have received and therefore took our innocence for granted. The innocence many of us were only granted because of the color of our skin and the neighborhoods we had these parties in. This is one of the main points that Wise stresses throughout his book "White Like Me". He wants to teach his readers that being white in this country comes with a lot of privileges that most of us fail to recognize. And one major step towards ending the constant battle of racism is for whites to acknowledge those freedoms which are routinely taken for granted.

Racism has never been something that only occurs on playgrounds at schools, or a phase that teenagers go through, much like rebelling against authoritative figures. In many instances, a person's racism gradually increases as they mature and heightens as they reach adulthood. An example, Wise points this out when he talks about all of the racial profiling that took place after 9/11. He explains, "Immediately after that tragic day, it seemed like you couldn't find anyone other than Arab and Muslim advocacy groups willing to speak out against the notion that anyone matching the description of a Middle Eastern male should be subjected to extra scrutiny at airports, for example" (Wise 48). For many Americans, whites in particular, this heightened security and the "random searches", which most every person of Middle Eastern decent happened to get chosen for, brought a sense of comfort and reassurance that nothing tragic was going to happen to them. Wise points out that such scrutiny took place after 9/11 mainly because the hijackers were not white. At first hearing a statement like that might lead you to believe that I think that only because I am racist and I think that unjust treatment like that is necessary, but that's not the case. Wise made it quite clear to me when he pointed out, "That Arabs are being treated with suspicion after 9/11, while white men were not treated that way after Tim McVeigh's bombing of the Federal Building in Oklahoma City, is entirely, completely about white privilege" (Wise 48). This was a really powerful statement for me when I was reading the book. Once again, Wise pointed out something that perhaps to nonwhites is something that screams racism in this country, but to me was something that had never entered my mind. After reading it, however, I am appauled that such actions took place solely based on a person's race. In my opinion, it's situations much like this one that reinforce the barrier walls of racism that our country has established.

Now don't get the impression that "White Like Me" is simply a book that points out all the privileges that most whites in America take for granted and calls us out on our racist acts that many of us overlook. In the last few chapters of his book, Tim Wise discusses how whites in this country can begin to resist and stand up to racism. Wise states that whether or not we're responsible for the creation of racist acts, "We clearly live with their consequences and the privileges that result - privileges that are unjust and harmful to those who don't have them (and even to those who do...)" (62). Although there's not one clear approach to ending racism, the author points out that we can all begin by choosing to resist it. In order for such resistance to occur, we need to make ourselves more aware of what it does actually mean to be a white citizen living in America and pay attention to how it effects our daily lives. Wise continues to say that, "Our world is far too complicated, and the opportunities for collaboration far too extensive to allow for perfect - or even fairly consistent - resistance by any of us. This is all the more true for those who reap so many benefits from our status as members of dominant groups: whites, men, persons with money, able-bodied heterosexuals, Christians, whatever" (101). This statement is not meant to discourage or insult anyone, but he admits that it's important to upfront about this topic in order to "own one's collaboration". I agree with him because it seems to me that throughout history many of our country's shortcomings were in part because of ignorance, and in another part because of someone's unwillingness to face the truth so they wouldn't look like the "bad guy".

Race has always played an important role in our nation and will continue to do so. It's time for whites, as the dominant racial group, to come together and overcome our innocence. We need to recognize that many nonwhites living in America don't see this country as the "home of the free". As Tim Wise put it, "...by owning our collaboration we can regularly see our own shortcomings, place them within the larger context of our culture's subsidizing of those shortcomings, and then commit ourselves to doing better next time" (102). Sure, this sounds easy when he spells it out for us, but as many of us know it's not going to be that simple; but that's no reason to just sit back and carry on as most of us had been doing before without even knowing it.

This has to be one of the most insightful books I have ever read. Tim Wise hits the nail on the head with every point he makes in this book. With all of the great personal anecdotes told throughout, it's impossible to put this book down. Tim Wise is truly a treasure to the fight against racism!

Tim Wise has been one of the most powerful white voices for racial justice in recent years. This book, like all Wise's work, is honest and accessible. He cuts through the denial and confusion to help us understand white privilege, and the responsibilities that come with it. I've seen Wise speak several times, and I always come away impressed. This book captures all of his energy and power. Great work.

I have had two moments in my life over the last few years that have decolonized my thought process. Listening to Calvin Terrell and reading WHITE LIKE ME by Tim Wise. Mr. Terrell introduced me to the book and the rest as they say is history. Mr. Wise takes a complicated issue and brings common sense to the masses. I have never had so many 'light bulb' moments in one sitting. The clarity of this book was refreshing and thought altering. I have read both of Tim's books and I look forward to his next installment.

I've seen other reviews stating that all white people should read this book. I think that EVERYONE should read this book. This book addresses race and race relations in a way that is unorthodox, clear and grabs your attention. As a race/ethnicity scholar and teacher, I'm always looking for ways to get my students aware of and concerned about (this is the tough part) racial issues in the US. Most feel and think that it's not a big deal, racism is over, etc. Most students express a "color-blind" attitude. But this attitude is harmful by ignoring institutionalized racism. The issue of white privilege isn't a new one, but Mr. Wise introduces us to some new ways of thinking about it.

There is a lot of material and excellent examples to take from this book, but a few really grabbed me. One is getting at how white privilge operates in everyday life and at the institutional level. The other main and often subtle important aspect is how white privilege is dangerous not only to black people and other minority group members, but to white people as well, on a psychological level. Tim Wise makes his case by appealing to white people on a gut level by appealing to their egos and sense of self without attacking them as "bad people." And I think that blacks and people of other races can benefit by understanding how white privelege often operates unconsciously...We spend most of our lives learning to be racist and it takes a lot to unlearn all that crap. Tim Wise does his best to set us on this path.

This may be the most important book published in 2005. Tim Wise's genius as a writer lies in breaking complex arguments down into easily understood, accessible, and superbly crafted prose. This is that rare book that can satisfy both those already actively committed to the task of dismantling white supremacy and folks who are new to the subject. I've personally given or loaned copies to more than a dozen people, and each and every one not only finished the book, but wanted to pass it on to someone else.

Not only is this book a remarkable read and encourage anyone interested in the subject and interesting dynamics, I was fortunate enough during the semester I made use of this book, an area college had an panel of guest speakers that included Tim Wise. Anyone who has an interest in this subject or have an opportunity to make use of it as a resource or reference will find it to be worthwhile.

I absolutely can not stand this book! I had to read it for a class and it made me so frustrated every time I read it. Wise takes his personal experiences and applies them a general truth for an entire nation. He can not write a page without adding in a little jab or condescending remark here and there. Grow up and learn how to support your argument without trying to insult people.

This is not a book to reach for if you feel the need to do some outreach to the "minority community." This is a book for those ready to start accepting both responsibility and liability for their own actions in this biased world, for those looking inward en route to taking outward actions. For others, wanting to "feel our pain" or observe in 99 ways the scars made (so as to better wallow in guilt or legitimate their research subjects), well this just might offer alternative choices. Tim Wise's memoir of a life in his work has cleared a needed path; others will do well by first walking in his shoes, then striking out on their own. Soon to be well-worn on many shelves.

Kudos to Tim Wise for having the balls to write about a topic most people are afraid to discuss. The book does an excellent job of mapping out examples of white priviledge that not many people want to acknowledge.

The world needs more people like Tim Wise.

Anyone who is white who takes being treated as an individual (not as a member of a group) in America should read this book. It is a very well written exploration of what it means to be white in America, and is a must-read for anyone who wants to understand what "white privilege" is and how racism still pervades every aspect of our society.

This was the first book of his I read. He has great anecdotes and a great all around way of writing. His books have really changed the way I look at race. His stuff on youtube is also very insightful.

This book is really useful around the house. I no longer have to worry if I have to sneeze and can't find a tissue, or if I'm running low on toilet paper, or if I'm having trouble lighting a fire, or if i need to prop up a piece of furniture on an uneven surface; this book comes in handy in all of the above situations and many more! Also, if I put it near where my cat likes to sleep, he rests his head on it like a pillow and it's so cute!

this book doesn't lie and I'll tell anybody who will listen despite having a African American President and having some things being more progessive, we still have a long ways to go. and this book breaks it down from the social frontier all the way around and back. he didn't say anything that i didn't already know and feel, however it did feel good to hear somebody tell the truth. this outta be a book.

One of the most honest and profound books I have ever read on white privilege. Tim Wise does an incredible job explaining why white privilege needs to be dealt with if racism is going to continue to be dismantled and resisted. Definitely a must read!!!!! :)

A truly insighful work of writing by Tim Wise. Hi analysis on the intersections of class, race and gender isn't as fleshed out as I would have preferred, but overall an excellent contribution to the struggle against white supremacy in even its most subtle (read: Liberal) forms.

Tim Wise's book is honest, straightforward and required me to respond with a similar level of honesty about my own family history and white privilege. Wise provides a moving example of the kind of intellectual clarity we all need to effectively eliminate racism.

Although I agree with the vast majority of the posts regarding the quality and insight of Wise's White Like Me, I think that, as a community of readers, teachers, activists and concerned citizens who loathe racial injustice, we must take care not to exalt Wise as THE authority on race and privilege in this country (basing this on another post that used similar language). Many African American scholars and writers - W.E.B. DuBoise, David Walker, Richard Wright, James Baldwin, Sonia Sanchez, Gwendolyn Brooks and Amiri Baraka - have been saying the same thing (from the black perspective) that Wise does in his book, and decades BEFORE Wise did. While I applaud Wise's courage, I think that we shouldn't fall into another white privilege trap, which is to exalt a white person for a revolutionary work on race, when this same type of revolutionary writing was done by people without privilege years ago. I would hate to think that we can only accept admissions of white privilege from whites, when people of color - who have suffered from it - took risks and challenged racism when the topic was far from vogue (dangerous, actually). There are many great thinkers and writers of color out there; read Wise, but supplement your knowledge from those who are survivors, too. Peace to my fellow activists of EVERY hue.

Never has a white man been more HONEST in telling the truth about the PRIVILEGE of having white skin. I have recommended it to several white people who have NO CLUE!!! Hopefully every white person on the planet will read this book and learn something about themselves!!!!!!!

BRILLIANT INSIGHT!

A masterful blend of storytelling and incisive social analysis. Tim Wise brings both personality and perspective to one of the most difficult-to-discuss questions in contemporary United States discourse. What does it mean to be white? Begin here for the answer.

This is an excellent book especially for anyone trying to understand the race issue in America at a deeper level.

It would be excellent also for highschool and college students

as a part of any class trying to study the issue of race relations in this country. People of European or "white" background would really benefit from this book.

three quarters through the book i have been nothing but satisfied. for the first time in "my life" i have heard the truth spoken eloquently and honestly about what has and is going on with our people. and until many more think as this man does, we are in for an incredible ride in a frightening direction. thank you mr wise and all others who are willing to look down in them selves and see the horror that is.

Tim Wise's book, White Like Me, takes a look at racism from the perspective of the whites in the United States. Through his writings, Wise hopes to be able to open the eyes of white people to the privilege that has been bestowed upon them as the dominant racial group in our society. "Being a member of the majority, the dominant group, allows one to ignore how race shapes one's life" (Wise 2). Beginning from this premise, by using examples and stories from his own life, he attempts to show just how privilege has shaped his life and what he has done for the fight against racism.

Privilege, according to Wise, amounts to almost every experience that a white person has within their life. Simple things like whether or not your presence in a certain area will be questioned or larger things such as access to college educations are all related to the color of our skin at birth. People don't automatically assume you are poor or going to steal when you are in a store, they don't cross the street to avoid walking past you, and they don't assume you are selling to drugs to buy your new shoes. This is not exactly the kind of thing that there is a lot of expert research on. All the evidence and claims that Wise make concerning the subject are all related to his personal experiences and his work relating to activism. However, this being the case I feel that he does make a very strong argument; I have been able to relate to what he is saying in many of his stories.

During one such story he recounts that in his youth he would go to underage keg parties and when the cops would come by they would do little except tell them to keep the noise down. There was no doubt as to the fact that kids were drinking and smoking pot, but no one was arrested and no fines were given. During this same time Wise was running a fake ID business for which he never got in trouble when he or anyone else was caught with one. Wise chalks all of this up to the fact that these homes were in white neighborhoods and that the cops weren't out to make trouble for white kids (35-7).

In all the keg parties I have been to, I can say that this definitely rang true for me. I have never seen any one get arrested or even fined at a party in Milwaukee when the cops have shown up. They merely kick everyone out and even that seems like a joke most of the time, people usually just come back within an hour or so.

Considering the state of the country with terrorism and national security, you'd think that law enforcement would take possession of a fake ID very seriously. If a person of Middle Eastern decent was caught with a fake ID, I'm sure they would have had a much harder time than a white person. I have known several white kids to have had their IDs taken away with not so much as even a slap on the wrist. On another note, if you go to almost any of the bars near campus, many of them knowingly let in people with fake IDs, yet nothing is done to stop it. These bars of course are packed to capacity with white kids.

Resistance is where Wise is trying to lead the readers of his book. To resist racism is to act in what he calls an antiracist way. According to Wise, we all have the choice to stand up and confront racism or to back down and say nothing at all (73). This can be hard for some of us who have family and friends whose feelings are really ingrained with a racist way of thinking. Again, Wise uses an example from his life where he stood up to a person he had just met who told a black joke to a room full of white people. Instead of saying nothing to the man, which he feels is worse than saying nothing at all, Wise chose to engage the man into a reflective discussion about just why the joke was wrong.

Wise goes about this subject of resistance in a way that has never been offered as an option to me or anyone I have ever talked to. To stand up and combat racism as opposed to simply ignoring it, telling yourself that you aren't a racist, or even trying not to think racist thoughts is a huge step to take. In effect you are shedding your layer of privilege and opening yourself up to the possibility of rejection or even ridicule. The most I learned from parents and school, as well intentioned as they were, was only that everyone is equal and deserves to be treated fairly. Had this combative attitude been implanted I may have been challenging the system as a younger person. We all might have, it's hard to say how many minds could have been steered away from prejudice.

One of the finer points Wise tries to make in his argument is that as white antiracists, we do not fight racism for black people. We have to fight it because it is evil and we hate it, we do it for ourselves and our community (98). We must however fight to keep resistance in our lives. No matter how hard you fight against racism, it can always rear its head in your life. Since we have been learning it from such an early stage and see it all around us, its almost impossible to completely change your mode of thought. According to Wise, we don't always act in an intellectual way, sometimes we just operate on conditioning. All it takes is a situation to bring to mind a stereotype and you are working against this antiracist mentality (134). Despite the challenges that come with being an antiracist, the work is absolutely necessary. Destroying racism as a goal might never be able to be accomplished, but nothing worth having has ever been easy.

The style of the author is like listening to a person that likes to talk about himself all the time. Kinda reminds me of the 1980 movie "Airplane" when the ex-fighter pilot tells the story of his life to the passengers; they end their lives in different ways after having to hear him...

There are no issues if you planned on finding one. There is no summary and never any conclusion to the issue of racism. It is an amusing story of a 36 year old that has dillidallied in the fight for Black Power. His talk about racism is not scientific nor scholar but simply comes across as to what he's heard. Just alot of personal events that make you dizzy in trying to remember that the author indeed has a point to tell after all the irrelevant details of his story come in pages after pages of paper product.

Amusing, yes, informative, no. I cant see either Whites or Blacks reading this and taking him seriously. So who's left? Nah, us Latinos just nod our heads...

This is one of the most important pieces I've read in the last few years. Very thought provoking and challenging. Be ready to shake your world to help in beginning to establish a better place for all.

I tried to read this book, but could not finish it. Wise is a precious and pretentious nitwit. This autobiographical sketch says less about race relations than it does about Wise's desperate desire to transform the random bits and pieces of his life into a memoir. I have up midway through; there's simply nothing compelling about his collegiate activism -- ironically, he proves "white privilege." Only a white boy could write a book celebrating an almost obsessive narcissism as though the rest of us could, or would, care. (Dp you recall the names of your junior high school teachers?)
He tries too hard, strains meager accomplishments, and bores rather than instructs. Race matters. No doubt. But Tim Wise has little to say on the topic. White Like Me teaches little and inspires not at all.

I fully agree that there is some racism in the United States. I don't agree that it exists at the level that Wise posits in this book, though. And, I certainly don't believe that his rants help anyone attain their goals.

The messages of self-described radicals end up eating themselves in the end. Extreme positions never work, right nor left. And, Wise's language is getting angrier and angrier with each passing day.

That said...Wise is a solid writer and this book is a decent read whether or not you agree with its message. He does not come across nearly as nasty in this book as he does on his blog. And, his admission that he became nervous when he saw that the pilot of one of his flights was Black provides some measure of humility to a guy who has made a career out of vitriol.

Pure ponytail garbage written by a self-loathing nerd. Summary: whitey is still racist; blacks cannot be racist; whitey must be reconditioned and made to renounce his position in the top colleges and corporate America so black people can have those positions. Really? Skip this book and instead read Jason Riley's excellent new book, "Please Stop Helping Us" or similar works by Thomas Sowell or Dr. Ben Carson. Those folks offer solutions to our social ills. Tim Wise merely extends the grievance industry.

I have to agree with a lot of the harsher critics of this book. I am liberal and Wise has some valuable insights for to an audience that hasn't thought much about race. For that, fine. I'm glad he wrote the book.

But the book could have been half this length (and it's not that long). Wise is so self absorbed, he is tedious. Beyond that, he has no insight into the fact that a lot of his privilege derives from being male, as well as white. He'll give examples of "white" privilege that are as much about his gender as his skin color, not to mention matters of class, as others have mentioned. The way he talks about his wife dutifully raising their two children almost by herself while he keeps writing and writing and writing was really hard for me to read. Better he should have taken over the kids for a month and let her finish the book, or, better yet, write her own. I bet she'd have a lot to say. I actually finished the book, just to see where he was going with his ideas, but I was sorry I wasted the time.

I recently came across two of Tim Wise's books in a local book store - White Like Me and Speaking Treason Fluently. I gave them a quick scan and decided that I wanted to read them both. I work in education and have seen white privilege at work; it's a topic I care about.

As I began this book, White Like Me, I found the reading enjoyable. Even better, I felt my own beliefs about racism and white privilege were being affirmed.

However, I won't be finishing the book or reading anything else by Tim Wise. On two consecutive pages, Wise makes commenst that are racist to the point that he's lost credibility with me. Let me explain.

When explaining why high school debate team is "so white", Wise states (p. 33) "The substance of the arguments made and the way in which the arguments are delivered also tend to appeal to whites far more readily than people of color, for whom the style and substance are often too abstract to be of much practical value." That is a disgusting comment. To generalize that people of color would not be interested in abstract argument because it lacks practical value is incredibly arrogant, demeaning, and racist.

Amazed as I was by that statement, I was willing to overlook it until I read the next page (p.34). Here Wise explains that the entire process of debate is "a white one." He writes, "...whites (and especially affluent ones), much more than folks of color, have the luxury of looking at life or death issues of war, peace, famine, unemployment, or criminal justice as a game, as a mere exercise in intellecutual and rhetorical banter." He then claims that being able to debate a position such as "whether or not full employment is a good idea, presupposes that my folks are not likely out of work as I go about the task." He adds, "To debate whether racial profiling is legitimate likewise presupposes that I, the debater, am not likely to be someone who was confronted..." with racial profiling.

Wise seems to be saying that because of their position in society, people of color are unable to engage in intellectual and rhetorical banter, to take equally either side of a position. He's saying that because they have experienced discrimination, they can not step outside of their own experience to discuss the discrimination from all sides. Again, Wise's arrogance is palpable.

The perfect counterpoint to Wise's claims is the current debate about healt care reform. People of color, some with health insurance and some without, are debating the pros and cons of a government-run health insurance option. They are able to discuss it intellecutally and rhetorically. They are able to look at both sides of the issue. They are able to overcome the multitude of ways in which the health care industry discriminates against them.

Tim Wise is clearly aware of "white privilege" and it's role in the continuing oppression of minorities. But his opinions and perspectives contain the covert and subtle racism that now characterizes much of American thought towards "people of color".

I'll keep this review short.
Tim's overall premise in this book is that so called "White Privilege" is based on the ever lingering racism that just won't seem to go away. Not so much the blatant institutionalized racism that was stamped out in the 60s, but today it is more subtle but still ever present according to Mr. Wise.

Mr. Wise's main argument can be easily debunked when we look at the actual facts. The success of Whites (and we'll include Asians as well) is mainly due to superior performance (and science would seem to suggest that this is mainly based on genetics), whether on school exams, job tests, job performance, college performance, etc, it doesn't matter, whites and asians simply perform better on most intellectual tasks when compared to people of African ancestry,

There have been numerous "twin studies" done in North America and Europe regarding twins who are separated at birth and raised by entirely different families in different environments. These twin studies unequivocally prove that genetics are the main determining factor when it comes to intellectual ability, and that the environment plays a lesser and smaller role.

How does IQ (or intellectual or cognitive ability) play into all of this?
I'd like Tim Wise to talk about this more and dive into the research because it's INCREDIBLY IMPORTANT, in fact it is the most important aspect of this entire race discussion the American nation seems to be obsessed with.

Higher IQ's correlate with more economic and financial success.
They correlate with better academic performance.
The avg IQ of an entire nation is often an accurate predictor of that nation's overall economic success (measured by GDP).

Are whites privileged? If you consider that being born with an avg IQ around 100 equates to being privleged, then yes, whites are privleged.
But watch out! The East Asians and Ashkenazim Jews have got the Whites beat by a few IQ points.

I wonder if Tim Wise will begin to highlight Asian and Jewish privilege in his books and seminars?
If you take a look at the college rosters at Yale, Harvard, and all the other major top universities, you'll now find that Asian students are represented in disproportionately high numbers at these universities (when compared to their representation in the overall U.S. population).

Surely these Asians must have some kind of special privilege. Why has Tim Wise ignored this?
Every time an Asian student attends these universities, that's one less spot for a potential black student.

Sweeping generalizations make poor content for any book. One sided views of race and race relations will never bear fruit that carries any real weight or intelect. Poorly written and poorly researched.

My pastor encouraged the church to read this book to help people pursue racial reconciliation. Before I get started, let me just say that I am not against racial reconciliation, indeed I am for it. And I think that Tim Wise, at least initially, started his fight for racial justice with good intentions. Unfortunately for Mr. Wise and for those who swallow this book whole, good intentions mean very little.

This book is almost entirely anecdotal opinion on the author's part, and is rife with contradictions and hypocrisy. I'll give you examples of how and why.

In regards to white privilege, he says, "While some might insist that whites have a wide range of experiences, and so it isn't fair to make generalizations about whites as a group, this is a dodge, and not a particularly artful one." This comes in the first few pages of the book, so right out of the gate Mr. Wise is already permitting the broad brushing of white people as a group. Re-read that quote and replace the word "white" with the word "black." Try it. Still think his statement is acceptable? Not a chance.

He says, "Though whites who came to America after the abolition of slavery can rightly claim they had played no part in the evil that was that particular institution, it is simply wrong to suggest that they are not implicated in the broader system of racial oppression that has long marked the nation." All white people are implicated in oppressing blacks then, got it. Including him I guess.

He even calls out his own grandfather as a racist drug dealer because his grandfather owned several liquor stores in a predominantly black area, and therefore is to blame for the alcoholism of those men in his city. I quote, "But at the same time, he had been a man whose wealth--what there was of it--had been accumulated on the backs, or at least the livers of black people." So I guess that because there are a few people out there who choose to abuse alcohol, his grandfather should have simply chosen another profession, even though selling alcohol is completely legal?

He says, "Recent studies suggest that even by the age of eight, and certainly by ten, black children are cognizant of the negative stereotypes commonly held about their group. Folks of color know they are the 'other', and pretty soon they learn what that means. What's more, people of color not only recognize their 'otherness', but are also inundated by whiteness, by the norm." First of all, he does not cite the source of these "recent studies", but he also makes no mention of how this early age indoctrination that blacks are the 'other' is most commonly delivered by other blacks, usually their parents or close friends. If you don't think that plenty of black parents teach their kids to be fearful and suspicious of white people at an early age, you're fooling yourself. Certainly there will occasionally be white people who live up to the stereotype that white people hate black people, but the majority of this fear and resentment is spoon-fed to them at an early age, before they've even had a chance to judge whites for themselves.

He says when he was a boy, it was a testimony that racism was entrenched because the maintenance man at his parents' apartment complex was black, and that they only knew him by his first name, and never knew anything else about his life. I would ask how many people know the full life stories of the maintenance man in their apartment complexes, white or black, today. Chances are, most people don't even know their maintenance man's first name, let alone his life story. That doesn't make them racist, but that doesn't stop Tim Wise from playing the race card anyway.

Another quote where Wise broad brushes whites: "Historically, white Americans have always felt the right to define black and brown folks' realities for them: insisting that enslaved persons were happy on the plantation and felt just like family, or that indigenous persons were the uncivilized ones, while those who would seek to conquer and destroy them were the practitioners of enlightenment."

He says, "Likewise, many whites today react hostilely to the use of the term 'African American' because it came from within the black community, and as such, stands as a challenge to white linguistic authority." He fails to realize that many blacks prefer NOT to be called "African Americans" and that many African-Americans, (you know, people who actually came to America from Africa) also object to this term being used for blacks who were born in America and have never touched foot on African soil in their lives. As much as he thinks he has a feel for the pulse of black thought, he drops the ball here and instead blames it on whites who are afraid of their "linguistic authority" being challenged, whatever that means.

He throws the modern Tea Party under the bus and assumes that they all want slavery to be re-instated simply because they like to dress up in revolutionary war attire for their rallies. He provides no evidence, statistics or even anecdotes or quotes for this accusation, but he hurls the accusation all the same.

One could even make an argument that Tim Wise, who is Jewish and therefore not actually "white" as it pertains to this context, is actually racist towards whites. He talks about his time at school and says, "I had a few white friends, but very few. Albert Jones, who is still my best friend to this day, was among the only white classmates with whom I bonded at that time. Frankly, even that might have been a case of mistaken identity." He also says that as he started coming into adulthood he noticed that most of his black friends drifted away and says "I wasn't really close to any white people. I was having to relearn everything: how to make friends, how to interact with people whose interests were different, and how to basically be white again." It's pretty clear that he doesn't even WANT to be white.

He talks about how he was one of a very few white guys on a predominantly black grade school basketball team, and how his team could intimidate all-white teams and beat them handily. I quote, "Fact is, our field goal percentage wasn't very high, but we'd always get multiple shots during each offensive possession because the other team was too afraid to fight for rebounds. It was as if they thought our guys might knife them if they even tried." So now he's reading the minds of the white players on the other team. Could it be that his team was just better at rebounding? Nope, must be that the other white kids viewed the black players as blood thirsty savages.

He talks about how he got an email from the mother of a very good white running back who wasn't getting playing time ahead of two black running backs who weren't as good as her son. She believed it was because the white coaches had racist stereotypes about how the black running backs just HAD TO be faster than her white son. There's no situation that Wise won't spin into a "white racism is to blame" story. Regarding the running backs, he says, "They [the white running back in this instance] end up the collateral damage of racism--not racism aimed at 'them', but a larger mindset of racism long aimed at black and brown." So the white guy, who's actually a better player, can't get playing time but this is somehow still white racism's fault? Can you imagine if the roles were reversed and a better black player wasn't getting playing time in say... ice hockey? Do you think Wise might say that the racism in that hypothetical scenario would be aimed at the black athlete? The double standards and hypocrisy are incredible.

Wise unintentionally insults blacks when he talks about how his favorite part of school was being on the debate team. He says "Debate literally exudes whiteness and privileges white participants in a number of ways." Then says, "The substance of the arguments made and the way in which the arguments are delivered also tend to appeal to whites far more readily than to people of color for whom the style and substance are often too removed from the real world to be of much practical value." So apparently he feels black people don't have the quick wit or intelligence necessary to be an effective debater.

He brags in more than one place about how he could be at a party where there was drugs, or he could be driving with drugs in the car, and law enforcement wouldn't care. He also bragged about running a fake ID business and that the cops wouldn't care about that either. This is all white privilege of course, according to him. If he really wants to make amends for his "privilege" perhaps he should drive down to his local police station and turn himself in and voluntarily serve time for all these times he possessed and consumed illegal substances and made fake ID's. Wouldn't bet the farm on that happening though.

He says he became aware of most burning issues concerning America's foreign and military policy through left-leaning punk music. Explains a lot.

He says, "And there must be a reason that, according to the available research, white Americans have such a disproportionate rate of binge drinking and substance abuse relative to persons of color--contrary to popular perception--and why rates of suicide are also so high in the U.S. and among whites (and especially middle class and above whites), relative to people of color." Again, he cites no sources and provides no evidence for this claim, he merely says "according to available research." Yet the FBI reports that blacks are responsible for nearly half of all murders and other violent crimes committed in the U.S. despite representing only 13% of the population. Shockingly, he didn't bother to mention that fact.

He says he was only able to even attend college because he was white. His reasoning is that he couldn't afford it, so his mother had to take out a loan, and his mother was only able to take out a loan because they used his grandmother's house as collateral, and the grandmother only had a house because she was white. If you think I'm joking I'll quote his exact words: "So in a very real sense, my grandmother's house, without which I could not have gone to Tulane, or to any selective (and thus, expensive) college, was there to be used as collateral because we were white." I'm sure his grandparents wouldn't have appreciated hearing that they were apparently given that house only because they were white. I guess their hard work, discipline and thrifty spending had nothing to do with it.

He tells a story about how a black kid in New Orleans bet him a dollar that he could tell Wise where he got his shoes. Wise took the kid up on the bet, and the kid says "you got em on your feet." and stuck his hand out for a dollar. Wise was impressed by the kid's cleverness (I would call it a deceptive scam) and gives him the dollar a pat on the back since he was actually out there gaming people instead of just "stealing or begging." He also says that most white people fall for the bet because they just assume that their vastly superior intellects could never be fooled by the inferior mind of a young black kid. Speak for yourself Tim, but don't assume that all white people harbor such thoughts.

When he went to college, he says that the university warned people not to go to the "black parts of town" for their own safety, but never warned black people of the many areas in the metropolitan vicinity where they might have been endangered. I'm still waiting for the evidence that shows there was some part of New Orleans where there was an abundance of white-on-black crime.

Mr. Wise says, "Nowadays, I lecture around the country in defense of affirmative action" ignoring the fact that statistical evidence clearly shows that affirmative action only makes it harder for poor blacks to get jobs. In fact the white/black income disparity and black salaries have only gotten worse since many of these liberal policies have been instituted, as shown in black author Jason Riley's book "Please Stop Helping Us: How Liberals Make It Harder for Blacks to Succeed."

He makes a blatantly anti-white comment where he says, "Upon being issued this challenge, one of the board members--either Sybil Favrot or Virginia Roddy (rich white women all look alike to me)--responded." Wow. Imagine if someone said "all black people look alike to me." His head would explode.

While bragging about his drug use (again) he talks about going to a Grateful Dead concert and says "Needless to say, if black concertgoers ever did as many drugs openly as Deadheads did, we'd need a lot more prisons to hold them all. But so long as you didn't do anything violent or disruptive, you could pretty well get as high as you liked at a Dead show, confident that nothing would happen to you." with the implication being that nothing would happen only because you're white. Apparently he's never been to a Snoop Dogg or any other rap concert, where the same rules apply. Drugs will be consumed in abundance at a rap concert, and yes, as long as no one does something violent or disruptive, you will pretty much be left alone. Police just don't have the resources to arrest every single person that's getting high at a concert, whether it be Grateful Dead or Snoop Dogg, so they save those resources for those who DO get violent or disruptive.

Wise takes a chance to bash his own Jewish heritage and says "To Korn and the hyper-Zionists who think like him, nothing Israel ever does in defense of the Jewish state is ever objectionable. Jews are always innocent, always victims, never victimizers--and to suggest otherwise is to make one an anti-Semite." The irony of the statement is so thick you could cut it with a knife. I'll let you figure out why.

He speaks about Pat Buchanan's criticism of democrats and says, "Referring to Democrats as 'cross-dressers,' Buchanan suggested that if elected, Bill and Hillary Clinton would usher in an era where children would be encouraged to sue their parents, and the institution of marriage would be utterly eviscerated by militant lesbians and Hillary herself." Now, I'm no fan of Pat Buchanan, but it seems he actually hit the nail on the head with that one, minus the cross-dressing part.

To me, the most sickening and hypocritical part of the book was when he defended Ice-T's "Cop Killer" song. I quote, "Ice had come under fire from law enforcement for the song 'Cop Killer' which appeared on the first album of his speed metal band, Body Count. The song, which told a story of revenge being taken on law enforcement because of police brutality, was seen by some as a call for murdering officers." Well no kidding, cops don't take kindly to songs which lyrics say "I'm a cop killer, better you than me, cop killer, F*** police brutality! Cop killer, I know your family's grieving (F*** 'em!) Cop killer, but tonight we get even, haha" and also say "Die, die, die, pig, die!" According to Wise, there's no reason for police to be offended by this song, it's merely art. I quote, "when violence fantasies are spun by black men, naturally, they are never just fictionalized accounts intended as art, but are to be viewed as ruminations on the inherent nature of the person singing them." Yet a few pages later he hypocritically condemns Timothy McVeigh and says, "168 would die thanks to McVeigh's bloodlust, fueled by right-wing anti-government hysteria and his admiration for racist fantasy novels like The Turner Diaries, parts of which were found in his car and the details of which he copied almost perfectly in the Oklahoma City bombing." Now don't get me wrong, I understand that McVeigh actually committed an act of violence whereas Ice-T merely fantasizes about it, but the fact remains that Wise judges McVeigh with a different standard than that of Ice-T when it comes to how they influence others and what they're influenced by. According to wise, The Turner Diaries were clear cut, right-wing, anti-government propaganda that CLEARLY played a role in McVeigh's actions, but Ice-T talking about killing cops? Well, that's just art, you see.

Even Hurricane Katrina couldn't escape Tim Wise's accusations of racism. He mentions how it was mostly the black parts of New Orleans that were inundated with water, and how the more-white Jefferson Parish didn't suffer as much damage. We'll make sure to tell Hurricane Katrina to stop being racist next time it rolls through.

He tells a story about how he was with a group of white men and one of them made a racist joke, and then he pointed out that this was a shameful way of "white bonding." And while he's correct, he fails to mention that the same thing happens among black people, in fact many black comedians make a living from telling anti-white jokes, but Tim Wise (and apparently the rest of America) isn't too bothered by that.

I could quote plenty more things that Wise said, but this review is already too long. Like I said, I think he probably started his journey with good intentions, but a lifetime of looking at everything through a "whitey is the devil" lens, I think his mind has become completely poisoned by the very racism he claims to despise and he oversteps his bounds in many areas, no matter what his intentions are.

I actually have another theory, however. He makes mention several times in his book about how he was often jobless, often broke, didn't make good grades in school, often struggled just to get by, did a lot of drugs, etc. In this way I think Mr. Wise is almost like a white Al Sharpton. Having no clear direction for his life or what he wanted to do, and struggling to make a living, he finally started making money being a controversial race-baiter. Before you think I'm being overly critical, consider this. Mr. Wise, for all of his hard talk about white privilege and the oppression of minorities, lives in a house worth $639,300 according to the Davidson County assessor of property. The neighborhood he lives in is 97% white according to Census Tract 134. He's a hypocrite of the highest degree and is making a living by hoodwinking minorities and tricking them into thinking he's a champion for their cause. Which in a way, makes him one of the biggest oppressors of minorities there is.

I just saw Tim Wise's KCET documentary on this book. I applaud those white folks who stood up for blacks during the 60's and was myself beaten up for being a black lover in High School.
My problem is that there have been many black leaders preaching motivation and empowerment over the years, which have ALL been cast aside as being Uncle Tom's. How would the black experience be today if they had embarrassed these leaders instead of casting them aside.

I would guess that 99.9% of black America have no idea who the first self made female millionaire was in the U.S. It was Madam Walker, a black slave! Why is this AMAZING success story not taught in the black community? Because it doesn't fit the narrative of blame and entitlement?
I just finished Jason Riley's great book, Please Stop Helping Us, it is a wake up call to how things could have been, if empowerment over entitlement had taken hold in the black community. Dr Carson should replace Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton as the leaders of the black community!
Folks desperately need empowerment, over blame and entitlement, to change the desperate conditions in or inner cities!

I understand race is a huge issue in the United States. I agreed with most of what he said about race. He certainly isn't a genius his points on race were pretty obvious but I really didn't see that as an issue. The problem I had was so much of his book was just bashing Christians and anyone slightly right-wing or conservative. His experience with Younglife did not need to be included in the book. Do you think an organization has changed at all since 1979? What does his experience with a religious organization even have to do with race? His writing is full of anger and isn't backed with any facts or statistics, he just hates people. I never would have read such a stupid book if it weren't required for a class at my University.

I have several problems with Mr. Wise's book. First, this idea of whiteness as a privilege is your basic post-modern de-contructionism that has been thrown at every basic conception to "turn it on its head." Its no more true than saying that blackness is an underpriviledge. I'm not goint to just adopt someone else's construction because they want me to. And I refuse to go around saying "wow I'm so privildeged to be a white male." Its all a matter of perspective. From my perspective, Bill Gates is prviledged because he is a billionaire. I'm not goint to say that I am priviledged, because from my perspective, I'm not. Now from a black perspective I'm sure I would be seen as priviledged. But I'm not black so I don't see it that way.

Second, everyone has biases and everyone prejudges. It is 100% human nature. It will always be so. Even black folks have prejudices. And in a country like ours that is race-obsesses, even blacks have prejudgements about whites. I would expect nothing less. We pre-judge as part of survival mechanisms that are always scanning for what is a threat and a danger. And let me tell you, where I live (in a large urban center), a young black male with ghetto-esque or hip-hop or whatever clothing styles and jeweley and gold teeth is more likely to be a threat. Is that always true? Of course not, but statistically, its a prejudgement that is protective of my safety. I'm not goint to judge myself for that because that is natural and almost automatic. However, if I then get to know this teenager and find-out that he's actually a really great kid and is not a gang-banger and I still fear him or have some ill-will for him because of his race, than that is straght-up racism. That is a belief about someone that defies empriical observation. We all use shortcuts to make snap judgements and assessments that are changeable once new information comes in. If we continue to hold onto those judgements in the face of new information, than we clearly have a strongly held bias or belief and that is a problem.

Third, I didn't kill anyone. I didnt' lynch anyone. I'm not bad-mouthing any minorities or refusing to hire people because they are black or anything like that. I don't care. I'm just going about my business and my daily life dealing with my own stuff. Why should I feel badly, guilty or responsible for stuff thats got nothing to do with me?

I'm a white male going enrolled in college and as a general education requirement I had to take a class that satisfied the cultural section of my degree requirements. So I took African Amercian Studies and we were assigned to read the book "Black Like Me" which was a great book(I recommend it) afterwards we were assigned this book. And I have to say I thought it was very misleading and unrealistic. IN MY OPINION I thought this book was basically trying to victimize whites and emphasize and magnify reverse racism. I didn't agree with the authors points of views at all. There are many studies that have been conducted(many by white males) proving that racism is very very alive still. Such facts like "A white ex con is more likely to get a job than a black with a clean record" and "names such as Tamika Jackson and Jamall Williams are less likely to get calls on their applications but names appearing to be white on the identical application were called for an interview" the facts are there, many people don't take the time to look for them or read them. It's 2009 now...it's time to end all oppression, all racism, and all bigotry.

This is nothing other than white guilt propagandized drivel. Don't waste your money. If you are seeking a title where the main premise is to further divide and infuriate our already worsening racial climate in this country then this title is for you.

To me, this is totally non-innovative. This is what we grew up with, the attitude (pc) we were supposed to have. I was white in an all-black school, often in minority-majority. This book (and the actually billion like it) are actually published to train the gaze away from the bizarre socializations of "white privilege." I wanted to be a college teacher (and put myself through school, from an under-priveleged white background. I went to college 10 years, but was given (lol) books to teach, just like this, which all could have been titled "Why this next group hates whites." From Maxine Hong Kingston's Woman's Warrior, Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart, Richard Rodriguez, Hunger of Memory, etc. We had to write things like this. All my teachers were (pseudo) "Marxists" (Marxist fronts for bankers), and we were told to use these positions to "infiltrate the system and destroy from within" by creating people like the author of this book. I taught college for a couple years, then left. It was too horrible! Teaching really poor Appalachians that they were "white privileged." This "author" (useful tool) ought to spend some time in Michigan and outside Pittsburgh in failed steel towns, where people eat cat food. The comments here just strike me, frankly, as typical racism. Maybe some of you really are some weird white-bred things out there, but in reality, you are cut off---and especially from where things like this are think-tanked---by whom, how, why. You are pathetic in your inability to think outside the box and to buy into ethno-politics. Did you know Trotsky coined "racism" as a term, and was bound up with the Bolsheviks, who using this thinking heralded in the first mass state-sanctioned slaughters of people based on "group identity" and "identity politics." You need to wake up, kid. And they will never publish this at the store. I read it, but there are far more important books to read. Even Shelby Steele's "White Guilt," from a thinking black man.

According to the Assessor of Property for Davidson County TN, Tim Wise lives in a house worth $639,300. The neighborhood he lives in, in Census Tract 134, is 97% white and ZERO PERCENT BLACK.

Tim Wise is a total hypocrite.

White success is not due to "white privilege". The fact that whites have been, and are currently, very successful even in countries that we never conquered (e.g., China and Japan), is proof of this.

As a matter of fact, whites are even more successful in today's China than we are in the West, where we are in the majority, where we supposedly have "privilege". Indeed, in recent years, many talented whites have left the West; left democracy, their "rights", and their supposed "privilege" behind for a life in "authoritarian" China, and have indeed succeeded in China to a much greater degree than in their former countries.

Why is this? It is because today's West, far from "privileging" us, is fiercely egalitarian, democratic, and is built upon a narrative of victimhood, and thus seeks to punish the skilled and talented in favor of bums and ne'er-do-wells. 300 years ago, the West's victimhood narrative said that the "common man" was a victim of his lord and his king. Now that the mobs have overthrown the kings and lords, the West's new victimhood narrative is that the "brown man" is a victim of the "white man".

But the West's system is not long for this world. Right now, we are seeing the fall of the democratic West, just like we saw the fall of the Soviet East in 1989-91. The fall of the democratic West is starting in Greece, and the other Western democracies, including America, are not far behind.

Tim Wise, Jewish by the way instead of white, has invented another excuse for the complete failure of blacks in America. Ever the excuse maker, liberal-Jew Tim Wise has invented the bogey man of "white privilege"! What is white privilege, you ask?

The fictitious "white privilege" is a system in which society, both economic and political, was constructed so that only whites can succeed. It is a "privilege" all whites have and no minorities do - even though whites are not even conscious of this "privilege". Obviously, anyone with the IQ higher than that of a poodle has already figured out it's pure pablum. Wise, born of wealthy Jewish parents who don't seem to have been hurt by the "white privilege" doesn't explain how Asians - obviously non-white - succeed in the supposedly "white privilege" system that was constructed so that only whites can succeed.

The fact of the matter is that hucksters like Wise must constantly invent excuses for the abject failure of blacks to succeed in any modern society, regardless of the cultural origins of that society.

If Wise really wants to shed light on racism and discrimination, perhaps he can explain how Jews such as himself - who represent only 2% of the total US population - control every major motion picture company, every recording label, represent 80% of Hollywood writers, producers and directors. Couldn't be the result of racism and discrimination, could it? Hmm?

Buy the book; dump the author and his premise.

Buy the book for two reasons

First, it's a book that belongs on the shelf of any book collector interested in U.S. Social History. When historians are writing about the "Fall of the American Empire" in a hundred years or so, this 250 page monstrosity will provide a good look into the causes of that fall.

And second, this guy makes the lecture circuit and has been known to lecture in schools. If you're a parent, you need to know what kind of poison is being poured down your kids' throats.

Wise succeeds, as other "privileged" limousine liberals have in the past, of dispensing what is becoming an all too common formula for social poison: guilt for whites, anger and despair for blacks. Whites have no redeeming value, have contributed nothing to civilization and should be "so so ashamed". (I know this because Mr. Wise tells me so). The poison for blacks is even more noxious. Blacks have no hope of making in this world because the whites have the deck stacked against them.

It's quite a social stew when you think about it - a bunch of embarrassed whites doing a "mea- culpa" and a bunch of angry and hopeless blacks. Of course, it's not completely hopeless for the black folks. People like Tim Wise and Molly Secours will be there to rescue them, and make a handsome living doing it.

Same old same old story.

Looks like Timmy's trying to make a buck out of conning minorities out of their "hard-earned" money by pretending he actually cares about them. I guess hoodwinking minorities is the new liberal racket. Wait, let me take that back. Not new, they've been doing it all along.

If your teacher makes you read this book tell him or her that they are racist, anti-white bigots. If it wasn't for whites the world would be starving and stupid. White pride in our history and future. Down with anti-white haters. The only privilege gotten today is the privilege we whites have been showering on blacks for the last fifty years. It's time for us to kick those spoiled brats out of our house and let them grow up and make it on their own.

The title itself, "White like me: reflections on race from a previleged son", is a lie. Wise is a Jew, not white. Let's hope the second edition will be called "Jew like me: reflections on race from a previleged son"

There's a fundamental problem with "White Like Me": Tim Wise isn't white. He's Jewish. Ah, but Jews (or most Jews) are white, you say. Not in this sense.

As used in this book, "white" is a political term defined according to Gramscian-Marxist principles. "Whites" are defined as an "oppressor class" without rights of any sort; "Jews" are defined as a "victim class". As a matter of logic, in the political sense, Jews cannot be "white". The book is an attempt to deligitimize the existence of whites, which is to say it is an attempt to legitimize the genocide of whites. How convenient of Wise to attack "whites" while maintaining an identity that is immune from attack!

This Pharisee needs to stop pretending he is an average "white man" and admit that he was born into Jewish privilege. I wonder if Mr. Wise ever visited Appalachia or run-down cities like Detroit where whites didn't have any "privileges" to fall back upon. Wise is deliberately directing minority angst and hatred toward whites. Meanwhile, he and his fellow Jews are conveniently able to dodge criticism by claiming that they are the world's foremost victims of the white race, which has supposedly always been anti-Semitic. Wise is a foil to condemn whites, dismiss and ignore their many contributions to civilization, and subtly promote Jewish supremacism by default because everyone else is supposedly evil or over-privileged.

Tim Wise certainly is NOT. He's a self-loathing liberal apologist who blames his own race for everyone else's imagined plight by spewing this "privilege" myth. See Larry Elder's books instead.What's Race Got to Do with It?: Why It's Time to Stop the Stupidest Argument in America. If you have to buy this thing, use it for a bon-fire. I think this idiot is going after the chip-on-the-shoulder crowd.

Funny he thinks white men have an advantage ??? That's absurd since white men have been discriminated in all fields of government and academia for the last 40 years. A negro female with a C average could get into any medical school in the USA right now but a white man wont even get in with a 4.0. I know, it happened to me ( I was told : Were sorry but you lack diversity ). The USA is toast.